Canada donating 13 million surplus vaccines

CARBIS BAY, UNITED KINGDOM — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau pledged 13 million surplus vaccines to help the world get immunized against COVID-19 as he and other G7 leaders wrapped up a two-day summit in Britain dominated by the pandemic, climate change and China.

Canada previously said it would offer up to 100 million vaccine doses to help poorer countries beat back the global pandemic, but was the only country from the G7 to not say how many of those would be actual shots rather than money.

Trudeau on Sunday said in addition to the 13 million surplus shots, Canada will pay for the purchase and distribution of 87 million doses through the ACTAccelerator, a global program to make sure the entire world has access to COVID-19 testing, treatments and vaccines.

The prime minister told reporters during a closing news conference that some of the promised jabs are already on their way to countries lagging wealthy nations in the worldwide immunization effort. But he stopped short of saying when the rest would arrive.

“A number of these doses are on their way as we speak, more will come in the coming months,” Trudeau said. “We’re going to be able to share around the world as we see Canadians getting vaccinated to higher and higher levels, and we simply do not need those doses.”

The Prime Minister’s Office later provided a breakdown showing more than 7 million of the doses being donated are from pharmaceutical firm Novovax, whose vaccine has yet to be approved for use in Canada.

The remainder are OxfordAstraZeneca doses and shots from Johnson & Johnson.