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Depending on what part of Africa you want to talk about, they already have robust drug manufacture and transport lines in place. Ebola'll do that to you. The issue isn't the stand-up capacity so much as, well, the recipe for COVID-related manufacturing specifically.

While we're on the subject:

https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2020/07/22/covid-19-remdesi...

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Not sure I agree, the drug manufacturing is not equal drug manufacturing. Production of a small molecule therapeutic (e.g. Remdesivir) requires very different capabilities of biotherapeutic manufacturing (e.g. antibodies). mRNA manufacturing is a different beast alltogether.

AFAIK, the main issue is transport, not manufacturing capability. The reason the latter is so tightly controlled is because it's not difficult once the process is known. And African countries are experienced in the former.

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