USAID Running Out of Money for Biden's Pledge to Help Vaccinate World, Reports Say

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - The US Agency for International Development's (USAID) funding, which is expected to cover the Biden administration's efforts to support the global COVID-19 vaccination campaign, is drying up, Politico reported on Monday, citing agency officials.

During 2021, the agency has relied on more than $1.6 billion provided by the American Rescue Plan to aid efforts to ship and administrate coronavirus vaccine doses across the world, the report said.

USAID reportedly has either used the funding or will disperse it over several months in 2022 for nations to obtain and distribute the vaccines.

If the agency doesn’t receive more money, it will lag behind its pledge to help the White House distribute hundreds of millions of doses to low- and middle-income countries by the mid-2022, the officials told Politico.

A healthcare worker prepares a Pfizer coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccination in Los Angeles, California, U.S., January 7, 2021.

© REUTERS / LUCY NICHOLSON

Last week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the United States has allocated an extra $580 million to support the pandemic response of seven multilateral organisations, including the WHO, UNICEF and FAO.

The secretary recalled that the US has shared more than 330 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to over 110 countries and economies worldwide.