Successful development and introduction of an effective COVID-19 vaccine may be our only path towards fully reopening our economies without fear of future outbreaks and associated health and economic impacts. Even as science and research progress, governments, CEOs, and the public are all asking how to finance development of next-generation candidates, speed up and manage the scale up of manufacturing, and prioritize doses in a supply-constrained environment, with the goal to interrupt global transmission. CGD is contributing to the conversation by offering innovative financing, organizational and policy ideas to solve these problems, drawing on its extensive experience diagnosing and addressing complex global health challenges.
Faced with the unique challenge of a solution to perhaps the modern world's first truly global health challenge, speed and efficacy are critical. CGD’s policy proposals focus on leveraging the "missing middle"—the private sector and middle-income countries, as well as developed economies. If we are not able to do so, we face the risk that this crucial task becomes an expensive exercise played along traditional donor and recipient lines, where national interests may trump the potential of the best science to advance.