Vaccine stockpiles
A VaccinesWork guide: news, context and reported dispatches giving you everything you need to know about vaccine stockpiles.
Why do we need emergency vaccine stockpiles?
When outbreaks strike, it is important to act fast. Alongside surveillance, testing, treatment and communications, vaccines can be a crucial part of the response, helping to stop the spread before an outbreak becomes an epidemic or a pandemic.
Stockpiling enhances the global community’s ability to immediately respond to these events, ensuring that the vaccines countries need to protect those at greatest risk are rapidly available and can be distributed in an equitable way.
Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, currently funds four vaccine stockpiles - for yellow fever, meningitis, Ebola and cholera – and is working towards establishing a fifth, for mpox.
Managed by the International Coordinating Group (ICG) on Vaccine Provision, these physical doses are housed in cold storage rooms around the world and can be accessed by any country that needs them, anywhere in the world, any time.
Their existence means that as soon as an outbreak of one of these diseases is confirmed and a request is made, countries can be vaccinating and protecting the unprotected within a matter of weeks.
To learn more about these stockpiles and how they work, read on below.
Everything you need to know about global emergency vaccine stockpiles
Q&A with Dr Allyson Russell, Gavi’s Senior Programme Manager for Outbreaks and Global Health Security
The vaccine stockpiles
- What is the cholera vaccine stockpile? [Coming soon]
- Vaccine profiles: cholera
- Meet the global oral cholera vaccine stockpile
- Cholera stockpile dashboard
- Explore our cholera articles
- What is the Ebola vaccine stockpile? [Coming soon]
- Vaccine profiles: Ebola
- From biodefence to the DRC: how the Ebola vaccine became one of the fastest vaccines to license in history
- Ebola stockpile dashboard
- Explore our Ebola articles
- What is the yellow fever vaccine stockpile? [Coming soon]
- Vaccine profiles: yellow fever
- How yellow fever decimated the USA's first capital
- Yellow fever stockpile dashboard
- Explore our yellow fever articles
An mpox vaccine stockpile?
With over 30,000 cases in 24 African countries since the start of 2024, mpox has caused over a hundred deaths and is spreading globally: 16 countries outside Africa are now reporting cases of the new, concerning Clade 1b strain.
Gavi has been working to help contain the spread, facilitating the delivery of vaccines to support the worst-hit countries in Africa. In the past six months the Vaccine Alliance has helped deliver nearly 500,000 doses across the continent, including vaccines purchased by Gavi plus doses donated by governments & manufacturers worldwide.
Plans are in place to create a permanent stockpile of these vaccines so outbreaks can be swiftly stamped out in the years to come. But this depends on Gavi securing a successful replenishment later this year. The Vaccine Alliance is aiming to raise US$ 9 billion from governments, foundations and private sector donors to support its work for the next five years, which includes funding for this vital stockpile.
Encounters on the frontline
