n April 11, 2024, Moderna announced that it had paused a $200 million plan to build a vaccine production plant in Kenya. Given little demand for COVID vaccines in Africa, the plans are unlikely to be resurrected.
This is a far cry from two years earlier, when the pharmaceutical and biotechnology company announced a $500 million investment in the Kenyan site to supply Africa with as many as 500 million doses per year of its mRNA vaccines. Although the initial plan was to start production in early 2023, the timeline and total investment was scaled back as demand for vaccines faded. In its cancellation announcement, Moderna stated that demand in Africa "is insufficient to support the viability of the factory planned in Kenya."
It is difficult to argue against this logic. Moderna delivered only 3.1 million doses to Africa in 2023, and countries are now canceling future deliveries.
The failure of the proposed investment is simply the latest in a long list of unsuccessful efforts at diversifying pharmaceutical production through so-called local production in Africa. Although production at strategically located regional centers would address issues of equity and supply chain breakdowns, which plagued distribution of COVID-19 vaccines on the continent, such centers should be economically feasible.
Here is where the idea for local production often breaks down. It is not only that new facilities would likely not be able to produce vaccines as efficiently as established sources in countries such as India and China, but also that infrastructure, technical know-how, investment climate, trade barriers, and regulatory frameworks may not be suitable for a sustainable production. Moreover, to be sustainable, a production facility needs to be economically viable, not simply exist (or fail) because of donations.