[단독]Vaccine security relative to the population, Korea ranked 34th among 37 OECD countries…

It was found that Korea’s level of securing the corona19 vaccine relative to the population ranks 34th among 37 member states of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the lowest. Among the OECD member countries, Iceland, Colombia and Turkey were the only countries that fell short of Korea. If the comparison target is expanded to 185 countries around the world, the ranking drops to 45th.

The JoongAng Ilbo calculated the ranking of OECD member countries’ securing vaccines to the number of populations, based on the ratio of vaccines secured to the population of 185 countries in the world, compiled by Bloomberg as of the 22nd. According to this, the total amount of vaccines secured by Korea is 64 million. Considering that the person who received the vaccine will be vaccinated twice (one dose of Janssen vaccine), this is the amount that 70.8% of the total population (3,6589,000 people) can receive.

Of the total volume that Korea has secured, the current official contract is for 20 million AstraZeneca vaccines. In the case of Pfizer (20 million doses), Modena (20 million doses), and Janssen (4 million doses) vaccines, the contract has not been finalized. The timing of its introduction is also unclear.

On the other hand, there are 32 OECD member countries that have secured more vaccines than the population (based on two doses per person). Canada has a vaccine for 511.3% of the population. Canada’s population is about 37.7 million, which means that it has secured more than five times the total population based on two doses.

On the same basis, the UK occupied 294.7% of the population, New Zealand 246.8%, and Australia 229.9%. Canada and the UK are in full swing with Pfizer vaccinations, and New Zealand will be vaccinated next March.

These’Vaccine Leading Groups’ have in common that they have actively started securing vaccines from last spring and summer, the early days of the Corona 19 epidemic. New Zealand organized a task force (TF) at the pan-government level and negotiated with vaccine developers even in the situation where there were 0-6 confirmed cases a day in May. Australia has adopted the concept of’distributed investment’ in the purchase of vaccines and has obtained vaccines from different types of manufacturing methods.

Kim Woo-joo, a professor of infectious medicine at Korea University’s Guro Hospital, said, “In order to form group immunity, about 70% of the population must be inoculated. If the amount of vaccine covers only 70% of the population, it is unstable even if the introduced vaccines are 100% effective.” He pointed out, “Moreover, buying a vaccine that exceeds the number of people in a situation where the efficacy of individual vaccines cannot be guaranteed is a kind of insurance effect,” he said.

It was also reported that the European Union (EU) has secured a vaccine that can sufficiently cover the entire population. The total population of the EU is about 484 million, and the vaccine security rate taking this into account is 172.4%. Among the OECD member countries, 22 countries belong to the EU. The EU, which starts vaccinating Pfizer on the 27th, will allocate based on the population of 27 member states.

Among OECD countries, the United States (153.7%), Chile (139.3%), Israel (137.6%), Japan (119.9%), Mexico (119.2%), and Switzerland (97.5%) also dominated more vaccines than Korea.

If the target is expanded to non-OECD countries, among 185 countries, Korea ranks 45th in terms of the amount of vaccine secured compared to the population. The number of countries that secured more than the population will increase to 38 countries, including Uzbekistan (110.3%). Nepal (92.9%), India (85.4%), and the Dominican Republic (71.1%) have a larger proportion of their population than Korea.

Among the countries that secured the vaccine quickly, there are many more stable quarantine situations than Korea. Representative places are New Zealand and Australia. In New Zealand, based on the World Omometer, there were 2121 cumulative confirmed cases and 25 cumulative deaths. As of this month, around 5 confirmed cases per day. In Australia, there were 28,219 cumulative confirmed cases and 908 cumulative deaths, and the number of confirmed cases was between 6 and 44 per day this month.

Professor Kim Woo-joo said, “The more important point than the starting point of vaccination is the time to reach mass immunity,” he said. “As we cannot spend this winter next year, the government should secure the vaccine in various ways even now.”

Reporter Lim Sun-young [email protected]