Working with countries and partners across Africa to rapidly expand equitable access to vaccines; it is in this vision that the World Bank (WB) and the African Union (AU) are partnering to support the rapid vaccination of nearly 400 million people in Africa.

African finance ministers and the World Bank Group met on Monday, June 21, 2021 to accelerate vaccine procurement on the continent and avoid a third wave. To boost the African Union's goal of vaccinating 60% of the continent's population by 2022, the two institutions announced that they are partnering to support the African Vaccine Acquisition Task Force (AVATT) initiative with resources to enable countries to purchase and deploy vaccines for up to 400 million people across Africa. This extraordinary regional effort complements COVAX and comes at a time when COVID-19 cases are increasing in the region. World Bank funding is available to support the purchase and deployment of secure doses by AVATT

World Bank Group President David Malpass believes that by working together, institutions can accelerate doses to countries and support deployment. Indeed, thanks to this initiative, the continent now has the capacity to vaccinate at least 400 million people, or 30% of the population of 1.3 billion. The aim of the African Vaccine Procurement Working Team, which is an initiative of the African Union Commission, the Africa CDC, Afreximbank, the AU Special Envoys for COVID-19 and the ECA, is to provide the continent with sufficient and rapid access to COVID-19 vaccines. It has already successfully negotiated 220 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson Janssen (J&J/Janssen) COVID-19 vaccine for use by African countries, with an option for 180 million more depending on demand