Sanofi-Pasteur to donate 100 million doses of pandemic H1N1 vaccine to WHO

"We welcome this very generous gesture by Sanofi-Pasteur. One hundred million doses of vaccine against the pandemic H1N1 2009 virus is a sizeable and generous gesture to and on behalf of the world's less-developed countries. WHO will now work to ensure that this vaccine gets to groups who otherwise would have no access to pandemic vaccines.

"It is gratifying that vaccine manufacturers are demonstrating their solidarity with WHO in protecting the health of the world's poorer people: influenza knows no boundaries and so to protect people in one country is to protect us all."

Sanofi-Pasteur made its announcement of the donation of 100 million doses of vaccine at the Pacific Health Summit in Seattle, USA. WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan will be speaking there tomorrow.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/statements/2009/vaccine_donation_20090617/en/index.html