"HPV Vaccine Shortage Impacts Millions of African Girls"

Merck's production problem will result in the delivery of only 18.8 million out of the 29.6 million contracted doses of the HPV vaccine to low- and middle-income countries in 2024, leaving over 10 million girls without their expected shots. This delay means that 1.5 million teenage girls in some of the world’s poorest countries will miss the chance to be protected from cervical cancer, as they will be too old to qualify for the vaccine in subsequent years. Merck has attributed the delay to a manufacturing disruption and plans to deliver the delayed doses in 2025, while also shipping 30 million doses of the vaccine to Gavi-supported countries this year, including some doses that were supposed to have been sent in 2023.