The company behind a COVID-19 vaccine touted as a key tool for developing countries has sent tens of millions of doses to rich countries but has yet to deliver any to a UN-backed effort to serve poorer countries, in a sign that the world doesn’t. Equality still exists in response to the outbreak.

COVAX had planned to deliver 250 million doses of the vaccine from Novavax by March, but the U.N. agency responsible for the deliveries said the first shipments may now not be shipped until April or May.

It shouldn’t be like this. CEPI, one of the organizations leading COVAX, gave Novavax $388 million to fast-track the development of a vaccine designed to make it available in poorer countries when the pandemic hit two years ago.

CEPI spokesman Bjorg Dystvold Nilsson said the investment guaranteed COVAX a “right of first refusal” for the first Novavax doses, but the deal was only available for plants in the Czech Republic, South Korea and Spain.

There are other factories that are not part of the deal – they are being targeted elsewhere.

The Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine maker, has produced millions of doses of Novavax. More than 28.9 million of these doses were sent to the Netherlands in January and February, while Australia received about 6 million, according to India’s foreign ministry and the institute. Indonesia also received about 9 million doses of the vaccine in December.

Thousands of other Novavax doses were also shipped from the Dutch factory to other EU countries.

“For whatever reason, a vaccine that was thought to be a good fit for poor countries is now mostly going to rich countries,” said Zain Rizvi, a drug policy expert at U.S. advocacy group Public Citizen. “Sadly, in the third year of the pandemic, we still don’t have the resources, attention and political will to address vaccine inequality.”

The delay is the latest setback for COVAX, which has been repeatedly hit by supply issues and missed many of its targets for sharing doses.

Last year, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus denounced the vaccine supply gap between rich and poor countries as a “catastrophic moral failure”.

Vaccine availability in poorer areas has been improving recently, but logistical problems remain.

Only about 14% of people in low-income countries have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, according to Oxford University. According to government figures, more than 680 million doses of COVAX’s vaccines remain unused or expired.

Even as vaccine supplies improve, some officials are eagerly awaiting the Novavax vaccine, especially because it is easier to transport and store than some other coronavirus vaccines. They also hope it may be more appealing to those skeptical of AstraZeneca’s vaccine, which failed to roll out in Europe.

Countries including Zimbabwe, the Central African Republic and Kiribati will have Novavax doses available from COVAX by March.

Before the pandemic, Novavax was a small U.S. company that had never brought any vaccines to market. Its lenses have proven to be very effective, but it relies heavily on other companies to make them.

The company has struggled to scale up production and has also delayed deliveries to other countries, including some in the European Union. COVAX should receive more than 1 billion doses of Novavax.

The Gaithersburg, Maryland-based company acknowledged in a statement that it has not shared any vaccines with Gavi, the vaccine consortium for COVAX efforts, but said it is ready to do so.

“We will continue to work with Gavi to achieve our shared goal of ensuring global access to our protein vaccines where they are most needed,” Novavax said.

Gavi believes the delay is partly due to the fact that the Novavax vaccine was not authorized by the WHO until December. Gavi said it plans to distribute Novavax in the future and is “in close contact with manufacturers and hopefully can supply supplies when countries need them.”

Health officials are also concerned that the urgency to vaccinate people around the world for COVID-19 has faded — especially as many countries lift preventive measures and the world’s attention is diverted.

Ritu Sharma, vice-president of charity CARE, said: “Rich countries have emerged from COVID and everyone is focused on the war in Ukraine, but COVID-19 remains a serious crisis for most of the world.”

She said COVAX was still desperately short of vaccines, and based on the current rate of vaccination, the world was “years and years away” from vaccinating enough people to stop future waves of COVID-19.

Other experts say public health agencies have a responsibility to ensure that their investments in vaccines will benefit poorer countries and make the problem more transparent.

“Whatever the explanation is, it’s unsatisfactory,” said Brook Baker, a drug expert at Northeastern University. “The bottom line is that there are still a lot of unvaccinated people in poor countries, and they are again at the bottom of the list.”