Billionaire pharmacist Patrick Soon-Shiong said South Africa can become the “Singapore of Africa” in health and pharmaceuticals. He made the statement during an interview with SABC.
Soon-Shiong said the continent can become a global leader in healthcare by fast-tracking the development of hi-tech, next-generation pharmaceuticals.
The businessman, whose net worth Bloomberg estimates at $15 billion, underscored that the COVID-19 health crisis exposed healthcare inequities worldwide, but added that South Africa can position itself as a second-generation COVID-19 vaccine provider.
“What we need to do is to look to the future and actually create what I said are next-generation vaccines,” Soon-Shiong said, when asked how to get Africa back on track in terms of vaccination production.
Current intellectual property waiver negotiations at the World Trade Organization are not the critical step in addressing vaccine inequity around the world, he added, despite the political capital invested in this process.
He stressed that the waiver is merely a piece of paper if there is no technological know-how backing it up. In the absence of technical knowledge needed to scale up vaccine production, it will be hard not to lose focus of the real goal, which should be to create self-sufficiency and capacity in the healthcare system.
In this regard, Soon-Shiong has pledged $213 million to aid the technological transfer needed to jumpstart COVID-19 vaccine production in South Africa, noting that the commitment could be the start of something truly impactful.
His pledge will help African nations speed up their vaccination program, as figures from the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggest that the continent accounts for just 1.5 percent of globally administered shots.
