IVI in the Media

South China Morning Post | The latest coronavirus boosters target Omicron. Are they safe and effective?

Financial News | IVI Director General Jerome Kim: ‘Bill Gates a strong advocate of IVI’

South China Morning Post | Scientists urge people to take second Covid vaccine booster if offered as Omicron continues to spread

Financial Times | Unvaccinated and unprepared, North Korea faces Covid catastrophe

Chosun Ilbo | Jerome Kim, Director General of International Vaccine Institute, named a distinguished professor at Seoul National University

Financial Times | South Korea downgrades Covid to a ‘Class 2’ disease and removes restrictions

South China Morning Post | China was the world’s biggest Covid-19 vaccine exporter. Not any more

The Wall Street Journal | Despite High Covid-19 Case Counts, Asian Nations Learn to Live With the Virus

Barron’s | China Eases Some Covid Testing Rules. It’s a Targeted Approach to Reduce Impact on the Economy.

CNBC | We need to treat Covid as an endemic pathogen and update vaccines: International Vaccine Institute

Financial Times | Beijing digs in to avoid repeating Hong Kong’s Covid mistakes

The Telegraph | Why China and Hong Kong face a devastating new Covid wave

CGTN | Why is China seeing a surge in COVID-19 cases?

Financial Times | Shanghai teeters on the brink of Covid lockdown

ADB Insight | Year of the Vaccine: The Next Steps for Asia and the Pacific to Combat COVID-19

Fortune | Will we all need fourth COVID vaccine booster shots?

The Telegraph | South Korea abandons its successful test and trace system as omicron cases surge

South China Morning Post | Can China’s home-grown mRNA Covid-19 vaccine pass its final tests?

The Guardian | Cuba leads the world in vaccinating children as young as two against Covid

The Telegraph | Vaccine hesitancy among Taiwan’s elderly mars its pandemic performance and prevents reopening

Director General Jerome Kim on The Alex Salmond Show

South China Morning Post | Which vaccines stop Omicron? Search for data moves from labs to real world

CNBC | 2022 will be the ‘year of vaccination,’ says director of vaccine institute

South China Morning Post | As Omicron upends Covid-19 vaccine targets, what will the future look like?

South China Morning Post | Omicron and the Winter Olympics – is China’s zero-Covid strategy up to the challenges?

CBS Mornings | With Omicron on its doorstep, countries in Asia are closing up

National Geographic | Omicron is dodging the immune system—but boosters show promising signs

Khaleej Times | Covid: 96% of people in low-income nations have yet to receive first vaccine dose, says expert

Voice of America | South Korea Showed How to Contain COVID, Now It Will Try to Live With It

China Daily | Experts say countries should remain cautious about reopening borders

South China Morning Post | Next Covid-19 test? Diagnostic blind spots stir visions of bleak midwinter

South China Morning Post | US-China coronavirus vaccine diplomacy heats up but can donations sway allegiances?

The New York Times | How Asia, Once a Vaccination Laggard, Is Revving Up Inoculations

South China Morning Post | Coronavirus: as rich countries turn to big-name booster shots from Pfizer, AstraZeneca, the poor are left with lesser-known rivals like Abdala, Soberana 2

South China Morning Post | Coronavirus: China seeks to develop next-gen vaccines amid trial complications

South China Morning Post | Can China stay ahead as a leading exporter of Covid-19 vaccines?

Maeil Business Newspaper | All music is beautiful in its own way, but Violinist Sang Hee Lee’s music shines a special light

Nature | Six months of COVID vaccines: what 1.7 billion doses have taught scientists

Asian Boss | We Asked Top Vaccine Expert About COVID Vaccine Problems

Bloomberg | Consequences of ‘Huge’ Global Gap in Vaccinations

EIU Perspectives | What does Denmark’s permanent suspension of both the AstraZeneca and Janssen covid-19 vaccines mean for other countries?

Asia Times | Vaccinations in a race against viral variants

Nature | Why COVID vaccines are so difficult to compare

DEVEX | Opinion: COVAX — too big, and too important, to fail

CNN | “Our response needs to be clear, strong, and unified”

South China Morning Post | Coronavirus vaccines will save 2021? Not so fast, here’s what the experts think

Bloomberg | Will the Covid-19 Vaccines Be Effective and Safe?

Asian Boss | Update On COVID-19 Vaccine Price & Schedule From A Leading Vaccine Expert

The Telegraph | ‘If you are not prepared, the virus has found every weakness’: How countries in Asia tamed Covid-19

CGTN | ‘The vaccine itself is not the silver bullet,’ says International Vaccine Institute

Devex | Q&A: Why Jerome Kim is ‘hopeful’ but cautious about distributing a COVID-19 vaccine

Maeil Business Newspaper | IVI Director General Jerome Kim Shares His Thoughts on Resurgence of COVID-19 Outbreaks in S. Korea

Chosun Ilbo | IVI Director General Jerome Kim Shares His Thoughts on Equitable Access of COVID-19 Vaccines

Channel News Asia | On a fast track like never before: The COVID-19 vaccine effort and 5 vital questions

The Economist’s Future of Healthcare Insight Hour | Vaccine development: A race to the finish line

Devex | Q&A: Is COVID-19 helping or hindering progress toward an HIV vaccine?

TED | The trials, tribulations and timeline of a COVID-19 vaccine

Wired Korea | The End of World War C: Peace without Victory?

Asian Boss | World’s Leading Vaccine Expert Fact-Checks COVID-19 Vaccine Conspiracy

Development Today | Why Sweden funds a vaccine institute in Korea and not Oslo-based CEPI

CNBC | Parts of Asia that relaxed restrictions without a resurgence in coronavirus cases did these three things

The Korea Herald | [Herald Interview] ‘Making vaccines accessible is biggest COVID-19 challenge’

CGTN: The Agenda with Stephen Cole | Speed of vaccine trials is ‘unprecedented’

Asian Boss | We Asked The World’s Leading Vaccine Expert About COVID-19 Vaccine

The Guardian | Test, trace, contain: how South Korea flattened its coronavirus curve

BBC World Service: The Inquiry | How do we come out of the lockdown? (13:00)

ANC 24/7 | Int’l Vaccine Institute: 12-18 months reasonable timetable for development of Covid-19 vaccine

Seeker | How Fast Can We Make a Coronavirus Vaccine?

Education City Speaker Series: Flattening the Curve – Global Responses to COVID-19

Wion News | About 70% of vaccines used around the world are made in India: S Korean expert Dr Jerome Kim

South China Morning Post | How long will a coronavirus vaccine take? A Q&A with Jerome Kim, head of the International Vaccine Institute

BBC World News | Jerome Kim: Vaccines are the long-term solution to the pandemic

The Korea Times | Developing vaccine against COVID-19

TRT: Bigger than Five | COVID-19: The World Reacts

South Korea’s fight against coronavirus (CBS News)

NDTV | Top South Korea Doctor On Why He Thinks Coronavirus Is Not A ‘Chinese Virus’

RTE | What South Korea can teach Ireland about fighting Covid-19

Physical distancing should last months, not weeks, says epidemiologist (Yahoo News Canada)

Development of vaccine requires massive investment… international cooperation is needed (Korea Economic Daily)

COVID-19 Pandemic (Arirang TV, 22:50~46:00)

By then, we’ll have a vaccine on our side (Hankyoreh—Korean)

Coronavirus Pandemic: International Vaccine Institute director on how long it will take to develop vaccine (CGTN)

Testing times: Why South Korea’s COVID-19 strategy is working (Al Jazeera English)

Genexine seeks to compress the vaccine timeline

Genexine, Binex to develop COVID-19 vaccine (Korea Biomedical Review)

Genexine, Binex to co-develop coronavirus vaccine GX-19 (Korea Herald)

How close are we to a COVID-19 vaccine? Jerome H. Kim from International Vaccine Institute (Arirang News)

COVID-19 vaccine, drugs on fast track for development: IVI chief (Yonhap News)

Inside the race to find a coronavirus vaccine (Devex)

Chinese students keen for turnaround (China Daily)

China Daily | S. Korea can try out makeshift hospitals, experts say

Director General Jerome Kim for Phoenix TV

Speed and accuracy vital for COVID-19 test kits (Arirang News)

2020 COVID-19 Live Updates: Jerome Kim for tbs eFM

Jerome Kim for KBS WORLD Radio, Korea24 on the COVID-19 outbreak in South Korea

Korea should join efforts in vaccine development to prevent pandemics (JoongAng Ilbo)

Future global health threats

IVI: COVID-19 could linger (Korean)

Jerome Kim for Korea, Factual: “Hong Kong’s handling of COVID-19 outbreak & Prospects of vaccine development”

Concerns about the spread of COVID-19: When will a vaccine be developed? When can we expect the “Super Vaccine”?

Al Jazeera English | Scientists call for global cooperation over coronavirus

When will COVID-19 vaccine be commercialized…And “super vaccine”? (Korean)

Global push to find vaccine against devastating bug growing

IVI receives $15.7 million to conduct Ph III trials of typhoid vaccine

Korean vaccines expanding global territory

Neglected Victims of Neglected Diseases

Let’s build a common defense against epidemics

Vaccine investment brings 16-fold return… partnering with Bill Gates

World must join forces to prevent infectious diseases

IVI editorial in The Korea Herald advocates for Korean leadership for global health

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IVI editorial in The Korea Herald advocates for Korean leadership for global health

Author
ivi
Date
2017-04-28 06:07
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5781
The following editorial by IVI Director General Jerome Kim was published in The Korea Herald on April 27, 2017.  Read it online here. 

Korean leadership for global health

In early 2017 experts worried about a yellow fever epidemic in Brazil, the worst in decades, that had already killed more than 200 people. Ironically, just one year before, Brazil had sent 18 million doses of yellow fever vaccine to West Africa, because an outbreak of yellow fever was spreading so rapidly that the entire World Health Organization stockpile of yellow fever vaccine was depleted -- twice.

The situation in Africa was so pressing that public health officials recommended the use of 1/5 of the standard vaccine dose, in order to “stretch” available stocks of vaccine. Thankfully even a reduced dose of this vaccine is highly effective in preventing a disease that at one time killed 10 percent of the population of Philadelphia. Ominously, in 2016, for the first time, there were 10 cases of yellow fever in Beijing, as some of the 100,000 Chinese working in Africa returned home while infected. Luckily there was no further spread among unvaccinated populations of Asia, where yellow fever has not existed

For yellow fever, an effective vaccine has been available for decades. If the 2016 and 2017 outbreaks of yellow fever remind us that adequate vaccine supply and appropriate vaccine use are necessary for successful defense against infectious diseases, the stories of zika and Ebola -- for which no vaccines exist -- make a different point: The development of new technologies for global health takes time, money and political commitment. Getting for-profit companies interested in global health requires innovative thinking and a mechanism to incentivize these efforts. One such initiative is the “Global Health Innovation Technology Fund,” launched in 2013 as a joint investment of the Japanese government, leading bio and pharmaceutical companies, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. A similar type of fund should be considered in Korea as a program that would harness the technological prowess of Korean companies and universities for the benefit of vaccines, drugs and diagnostics for global health.

Japan’s GHIT is considered a big success story. In GHIT the Japanese Ministry of Health, Welfare and Labor and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs contribute 50 percent of the funding, while the Gates Foundation and five Japanese companies contribute 25 percent each. The partnership had five participating companies initially, but now 16 companies participate. This year the Japanese government announced that it would add $130 million more to the fund, and GHIT has already invested more than $75 million in over 70 projects to develop drugs, vaccines and diagnostics. These grants are awarded on the basis of commercial potential and the likelihood of “efficient and effective” development of innovative technologies with the capacity to save lives and improve the health of people around the globe.

In Korea there are examples of successful public private partnerships. Shin Poong Pharmaceuticals, with the assistance of the Medicines for Malaria Venture, a product development partnership funded by the Gates Foundation, developed a new drug to fight against malaria. Similarly, the International Vaccine Institute, a non-profit international organization based in Korea, with funding from Korea, Sweden, and the Gates Foundation developed a vaccine against the disease cholera and transferred the manufacturing technology to EuBiologics, a small Korean biotechnology company.

Last year EuBiologics signed a long-term vaccine supply contract with UNICEF for the global cholera vaccine stockpile managed by WHO. One million doses of this vaccine were sent to Haiti to deal with a cholera outbreak that occurred just after Hurricane Matthew devastated the island. Both of these development activities represent opportunities that were “isolated” efforts in malaria and cholera; GHIT extends that model more broadly to infectious diseases of global importance.

A Korean GHIT would have value at multiple levels. Products developed by Korean GHIT are, by design, commercializable and of value to the global health. It signals a commitment to the goals of sustainable development and health (the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3). It highlights Korean leadership as the current chair of the Global Health Security Agenda. Successful products have a potential to create new companies and new jobs -- and will give Korean universities, research institutes and companies an opportunity to apply their creativity to the pressing problems of global health. Given existing commitments to biotechnology, the GHIT leverages Korean taxpayer monies with funding from companies and from private philanthropy. Korea’s stated goal is to develop 17 new drugs by 2020 and to emerge as one of the top five vaccine producers in the world by 2025. A Korean GHIT could be the engine that turns ideas into better health, and a more competitive biotechnology industry.

By Jerome Kim

Jerome Kim is MD, director general of International Vaccine Institute. -- Ed.