The first COVID-19 vaccine doses distributed by the World Health Organization’s global sharing scheme COVAX were dispatched to Ghana, West Africa on Wednesday, per Reuters.

Why it matters: The initiative has more than 180 nation participants and is part of the global effort from the WHO and other groups to ensure that every country has access to COVID-19 vaccines. Some 600,000 doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine are now in Ghana's capital Accra, Reuters notes.

Go deeper: U.S. commits $4 billion to COVAX vaccine initiative