COVID vaccine may not be available for poorer nations.

Washington, February 12 (RHC)-- U.S. President Joe Biden says his administration has secured the 200 million vaccine doses from Pfizer and Moderna he announced last month — meaning there will be enough shots to inoculate 300 million U.S. residents by the end of July.

Meanwhile, STAT News reports that U.S. COVID-19 vaccination rates closely track with wealth, with the richest gaining access to vaccines at a faster pace than low-income people.  The vaccine wealth gap has exacerbated racial disparities, with Black and Latino people receiving far fewer vaccines, proportionately, than white people.

This comes amid warnings over growing global inequity in vaccine distribution.  Duke University health researcher Andrea Taylor told The Washington Post: “It remains to a large degree a zero-sum game, which means that every dose that goes to the U.S. or the U.K. or an E.U. country is a dose that’s off the shelves.  And the shelves aren’t going to be restocked for a while.”