Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has said that people could need multiple doses of a potential coronavirus vaccine to immunize oneself. In an interview with CBS Evening News, Gates said if necessary, the multiple doses could require more than 7 billion vaccinations to be administered worldwide. "None of the vaccines at this point appear like they'll work with a single dose. That was the hope at the very beginning," he said.
Gates, who has been warning about the threat of a global pandemic since 2015, said that deploying a vaccine will require a global effort. "If what you're trying to do is block all the transmission, then you need to get 70-80% coverage on a global basis. So it is unbelievably big numbers," the billionaire philanthropist said.
He also said that there will be a lot of uncertainty about the efficacy of any vaccine while also stressing that its a solution "that will improve over time." The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has donated $300 million towards the global effort to beat Covid-19.
Over 150 COVID-19 vaccines are currently at different stages of development, with a few advancing to the late-stage clinical trial.
In a blog post, Bill Gates had earlier said: "We need to make billions of doses, we need to get them out to every part of the world, and we need all of this to happen as quickly as possible."
The world will need to manufacture and distribute at least seven billion doses of the vaccine -- or possibly 14 billion if it is a multi-dose vaccine - to beat the pandemic, he had said.
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