WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the prospects for equitable distribution were at "serious risk."

As COVID-19 vaccination begins in Canada and the U.S., experts warn that less than 10 per cent of people in the world’s poorest countries will have access to vaccines.

COVAX — created to ensure the entire world has access to COVID-19 vaccines — has secured only a fraction of the 2 billion doses it hopes to buy over the next year.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed for $4.2 billion in the next two months for the World Health Organization's COVAX program.

COVAX is offering participants COVID-19 doses for at least 20 per cent of each country's population that will be delivered as soon as they're available.

Efforts to elevate national interests over collective global health result in slower progress and limited global capacity to pool resources, these medical experts say.

U.S. public health officials and Pfizer Inc said on Thursday a vaccine could be ready for distribution as soon as late October.

The World Health Organization's COVAX initiative is meant to fight against coronavirus vaccine hoarding by some countries.

The World Health Organization wants richer countries to pledge not to hoard a future coronavirus vaccine for themselves.