A logo is pictured on the World Health Organization (WHO) headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, November 22, 2017. (Photo: REUTERS)

In 2021, the WHO picked South African biotech firm Afrigen Biologics and local vaccine-maker Biovac for a proof-of-concept pilot project to give poor and middle-income countries the know-how and licences to make COVID vaccines. 

Afrigen Biologics has used the publicly available sequence of Moderna’s mRNA COVID vaccine to make its own version of the shot - AfriVac 2121 - at lab scale and is now scaling up production. 

The hub decided to pursue the vaccine on its own after global pharmaceutical firms, including Moderna and Pfizer declined to provide the technical know-how to replicate their vaccines mainly over intellectual property concerns.