2nd shots of AstraZeneca vaccine to resume on Sunday or Monday: Health Minister
Another 34 lakh doses of Sinopharm vaccine and 60 lakh doses of Pfizer will be available in August, Zahid Maleque says
Health Minister Zahid Maleque said the inoculation with the second dose of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines will resume on Sunday or Monday.
More than 15 lakh people in the country who received the first jab of AstraZeneca but could not get the second one thanks to supply shortage will be jabbed now.
The health minister made the disclosure at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport on Saturday after receiving the second consignment of the AstraZeneca vaccine from Japan under the COVAX facility.
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Bangladesh started its mass vaccination drive with AstraZeneca doses on 7 February. So far 58.20 lakh people took one dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab, while 42.98 lakh took only one dose.
Many of the recipients were awaited for the second shots as India stopped exporting vaccines as the Covid situation worsened there.
Cathay Pacific Airways arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, carrying 781,320 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines, from Japan at 3:15 pm on Saturday, according to a press release of the foreign ministry.
Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen and Health Minister Zahid Maleque received the second consignment of AstraZeneca vaccines.
Health Minister Zahid Maleque said, "We will start vaccinating those who have not received the second dose of AstraZeneca from tomorrow."
"We received 7.81 lakh doses of vaccines on Saturday. We earlier received more than 2 lakh doses of vaccines. In total, we have received more than 10 lakh vaccines from the Japanese government. More than 6 lakh more vaccines will come in August. Thus, we will get more than 30 lakh vaccines," the health minister said.
Zahid Maleque said "We will start inoculation at union level from 7 August. We have opened vaccination centres in every union where three booths will be. The vaccination will continue for a week. With these, we will administer more than one crore vaccines."
"Currently, we have 12,189,000 doses of vaccine. Another 34 lakh doses of the Sinopharm vaccine will arrive in the first or second week of August. Additionally, more AstraZeneca vaccines will arrive and 60 lakh doses of Pfizer will be available in August," the minister also said.
