18 million monkeypox vaccines needed to protect most at risk, 85 million to protect wider gay community and health workers

Airfinity analysis shows the potential global demand for the monkeypox vaccine under three potential demand scenarios. These scenarios have been compared to Bavarian Nordic’s stated annual production capacity of 30 million doses a year and assume a single fractional dosing strategy. The medium demand scenario comprises 40 million people and includes the estimated global MSM population. Under this scenario, it would be December 2023 before enough vaccines were ready.

Lastly, the high demand scenario, which could be expected if transmissibility increased greatly and the outbreak could not be contained, also covers all healthcare workers. The demand for this scenario, which totals 85 million people, could only be met by June 2025 at current production capacity.

Currently demand for the Bavarian Nordic monkeypox vaccine is outstripping supply with shortages reported in multiple countries. The company has indicated that 4 million doses will become available by the end of 2022, a figure that is very far from the 18 million needed to vaccinate all the at-risk MSM population.

The global stockpile of vaccines is also not known but the World Health Organisation* estimates there to be 16 million doses of the Bavarian Nordic vaccine currently in bulk form in the US stockpile. However, these will take months to fill/finish before they are ready to be distributed, a process that is expected to begin in January 2023.

Dr Matt Linley, Analytics Director at Airfinity says, “Wealthy countries have been rushing to secure doses since the outbreak began in May. Our data shows only 1.5 million have been delivered since May, and 1.1 million has been to the US alone.

“Our analysis assumes that only the MSM and, in the worst case scenario, healthcare workers, will be eligible for vaccination. However, if the virus continues to evolve and human adaptation occurs, other groups such as children could be at risk. Over a billion doses would then be needed to protect the world’s children”.

To request more information about Airfinity's demand forecasting and methodology, get in touch here.

* The high-risk MSM population as defined by the CDC. 

** The WHO estimates there to be 16 million doses globally of Bavarian Nordic’s vaccine substance