Chilean Trees and a Widespread Vaccine

An early October Yahoo! Finance article by authors Aislinn Laing and Allison Martell covered the rising importance of the Chilean quillay tree that could support the production of over 4.4 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses in 2022. Unfortunately, the drugmaker Novavax Inc. can only use the molecules from mature quillays to develop this vaccine – those only found in nature. ImportGenius data references how the supply of these older trees likely will not match the demand. The quillays may be wiped out by the pressure to create a life-saving solution to be distributed in low- and middle-income countries. Scientists will have to figure out a lab-grown alternative or risk decimating the native Chilean flora.