Congressman Krishnamoorthi Supports Biden Administration’s New Vaccine Donation Promise, But Calls For More

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, in response to the news that the Biden Administration is buying hundreds of millions of additional doses of the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine to donate around the world, Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) issued the following statement:

"As founder and co-chair of the COVID-19 Global Vaccination Caucus, I am encouraged by the news that President Biden intends to donate hundreds of millions of additional doses of the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine. With more than 4.5 billion people around the world who have yet to receive a single dose of any COVID-19 vaccine, including less than 2% of the populations of low-income countries, there is an urgent and dire global need for access to these lifesaving vaccines.

This is undoubtedly a step in the right direction, but I urge the President to take bolder action as soon as possible. While the Administration has already committed to donating 600 million doses worldwide, only 140 million have actually been donated. With 4.5 billion people unvaccinated globally and with the potential need for booster shots, the time for half measures is over. We need to be talking about billions of vaccines, not millions, and we need those vaccines today, not 6 months from now.

I have advocated and continued to advocate for aggressively expanding global vaccine manufacturing capacity to produce an additional 8 billion doses over the next year, as laid out in the NOVID Act (H.R. 3778/S 1976), and I have called on the Administration to create a Pandemic Preparedness and Response Program, modeled on the President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), to assist low-income countries with COVID-19 vaccine delivery and administration.

I look forward to learning more details about the Administration's proposal at the Global COVID-19 Summit next week, and I encourage the President to act decisively now."