Vaccine Procurement: A Conceptual Framework Based on Literature Review

Abstract

Ensuring timely access to affordable vaccines has been acknowledged as a global public health priority, as also recently testified by the debate sparked during the COVID-19 pandemic. Effective vaccine procurement strategies are essential to reach this goal. Nevertheless, this is still a neglected research topic. A narrative literature review on vaccine procurement was conducted, by retrieving articles from four academic databases (PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, Embase, WebOfScience), ‘grey’ literature reports, and institutional websites. The aim was to clarify key concepts and definitions relating to vaccine procurement, describe main vaccine procurement methods, and identify knowledge gaps and future perspectives. A theoretical conceptual framework was developed of the key factors involved in vaccine procurement, which include quality and safety of the product, forecasting and budgeting, procurement legislation, financial sustainability, and plurality of manufacture, contracting, investment in training, storage and service delivery, monitoring and evaluation. This information can be useful to support policymakers during planning, implementation, and evaluation of regional and national vaccine procurement strategies and policies.

The Risk of Spontaneous Abortion Does Not Increase Following First Trimester mRNA COVID-19 Vaccination

“…Vaccine development in the European Union (EU) begins with preclinical in vitro and in vivo testing in the laboratory, followed by clinical testing in phase 1 conducted on healthy volunteers [ 1 ]. After confirming their safety and pharmacokinetics in humans, vaccines are progressed to phase 2 trials, which continue to assess their safety and pharmacokinetics in the targeted patient population and typically establish the dose to be used in phase 3 trials, which are larger, pivotal clinical trials that evaluate the vaccine’s efficacy [ 2 ]. In essence, these clinical studies collect detailed information about how vaccinations function and guarantee that their benefits surpass any possible adverse effects or hazards [ 3 ].…”

Improving Vaccine Assessment Pathways and Decision Making in the Polish Immunization Program

“…Poland should consider revising its procurement criteria to ensure a holistic evaluation, encompassing factors beyond cost, such as storage, transport, and patient preferences. Exploring risk-sharing mechanisms could also enhance price flexibility and increase vaccine security [ 44 ].…”

Implementation and Sustainability Assessment of a Public Procurement Strategy

“…The efficacious and safe vaccine, distributed equitably and rapidly, has been acknowledged as a global public health priority [10]. It has been considered to be an effective long-term solution to the COVID-19 pandemic, since it is supposed to minimize morbidity and mortality, once a high proportion of the population is immunized [11], and also to have clinical and socioeconomic benefits [12].…”

“…Nevertheless, little effort has been exerted in the area of procurement which is a key link in the COVID-19 vaccine supply chain. As a matter of fact, Gianfredi et al (2021) presented a review, based on the limited available literature, and concluded that the optimizing costs and avoiding vaccine unavailability, while enhancing equity and global accessibility, is possible through a sustainable vaccine procurement system [10].…”

“…Contracts for the procurement of doses of the COVID-19 vaccines, are negotiated by countries singly or in a group [10], under confidential purchasing agreements. In this context, the European Union pre-ordered a large volume of vaccines to benefit from the economies of scale.…”