Staff Correspondent: Dhaka, Aug-31,
Twenty lakh more doses
of the Sinophamrm vaccine are expected to reach Dhaka from China early Tuesday.
The vaccine doses are
scheduled to land at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport on a flight of
Biman Bangladesh Airlines at 2.30am, according to the health ministry.
On August 16,
Bangladesh, China and Incepta Vaccine Limited signed a memorandum of
understanding (MoU) on the coproduction of Sinopharm vaccine in Bangladesh.
Incepta, a leading
pharmaceutical company of Bangladesh, will bring in bulk and bottling,
labelling and finishing of the vaccine will be done locally, making the price
relatively very cheap.
China has provided 2.1
million doses of Sinopharm vaccine as a gift to Bangladesh, 3.4 million doses
under the COVAX facility, and 8 million doses as part of an arrangement of a
large-scale commercial purchase so far.
Till now, 13.5 million
Sinopharm vaccines have arrived from China. Of them, 1.1 million shots were
received under the COVAX facility.
Bangladesh is now
administering vaccines developed by four companies – AstraZeneca,
Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Sinopharm.
The government has
administered at least 26,129,187 doses of Covid vaccines – enough to have
vaccinated around 7.8% of the country's population, assuming every person needs
two doses.
Bangladesh has
administered 9,842,979 shots of Sinopharm as the first dose and 1,837,817 as
the second dose so far.
The Covid vaccines
cannot offer 100% protection but when more people are jabbed there is less
opportunity for the virus to infect and spread.
Getting vaccinated
prevents severe illness, hospitalisations, and death; and with the Delta
variant; this is more urgent than ever, according to the US Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention.
Since the start of the
Covid pandemic, Bangladesh has recorded 1,497,261 infections and 26,109 deaths,
according to the Directorate General of Health Services.
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