G20 aims to collect $1.5b to prevent, prepare for future pandemics

Sadikin said the money will be used to produce emergency tools needed for timely and equitable responses to future pandemics, including vaccines, therapeutics, medicines, personal protective equipment (PPE), and testing kits, that will be equally distributed to all countries once another pandemic strikes.

The minister said the G20 members agreed that they needed some connected sequence laboratories to identify and share genome sequence data from pathogens that can cause outbreaks.

"By having such connected labs we can anticipate or overcome an outbreak better. We will be able to get information faster with stronger data sharing mechanisms, then diagnose faster, then we can produce vaccines faster."

The minister said the G20 forum agreed to build several additional global research and manufacturing hubs in Southern countries for pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.

Most of the countries in the Global South are underdeveloped and developing countries, which faced more difficulties in facing the pandemic and obtaining access to vaccines.

Sadikin said that the ideal countries to build the hubs were those with large populations.