US’ Moderna, China’s Sinopharm vaccines arrive
Bangladesh on Friday received Moderna Covid-19 vaccine from United States (US) as gift under the COVAX framework while Chinese Sinopharm vaccine those Dhaka purchased from Beijing also arrived in the small hours of Saturday.
Foreign minister AK Abdul Momen and health and family welfare minister Zahid Malik were present at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) to receive the vaccines.
At first, the ministers received the first consignment of 1.3 million, out of 2.5 million doses of the US’s Moderna vaccine, from US Ambassador Earl Miller after a flight carrying the jabs reached at the airport at 11:30pm.
After nearly one hour later, both the ministers received the first consignment purchased from China by Bangladesh government at the airport, carried by an aircraft of Bangladesh Biman.
The second consignment of 1.2 million doses of Moderna vaccines and another shipment of Sinopharm inoculation are scheduled to reach Bangladesh on Saturday.
Earlier, Bangladesh received 1.1 million doses of Sinopharm vaccine from China as gift in two occasions in May and June this year.
The vaccine consignments have been reaching the country as good news for Bangladesh as Dhaka has been desperately looking for vaccines to inoculate huge numbers of people.
On Thursday, the foreign minister expressed his optimism that the shortage of Covid vaccine would be over soon as Dhaka is expecting steady supplies of jabs from different sources.
On the same day, the health minister, in a video message said, the government will resume the regular vaccination drive after getting these 4.5 million doses of US and Chinese vaccine.
Dhaka had urged Washington DC to send two million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine immediately after knowing that the US had 60 to 80 million AstraZeneca shots in stock.
Besides, Bangladeshi diaspora community filed a petition to the White House seeking vaccine doses.
Meanwhile, negotiation has been going on between Bangladesh and China and Russia to bring adequate vaccines in the country as soon as possible while the foreign minister earlier said the government is hopeful to make a formal announcement soon on coproduction of Covid-19 vaccine in Bangladesh.
The health ministry has been negotiating to purchase 15 million (105 crore) doses of Chinese vaccine and to import five million doses of Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine from Russia, according to the official sources.
On 21 January, Bangladesh received its first ever Covid-19 vaccine consignment as India sent 20 million doses of inoculate as gift.
Bangladesh has so far received 12 million (1.2 crore) doses of vaccine from the Serum Institute of India (SII).
On 29 June, the Directorate General of Drug Administration (DGDA) approved Emergency Use Authorisation (EUA) of Covid-19 Moderna vaccine in the country.
Bangladesh has so far approved eight Covid-19 vaccines to control the deadly disease.
The approved Covid-19 vaccines are from Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, CoronaVac, Pfizer, Covishield, Sputnik V, AstraZeneca and Sinopharm.
As many as 72,48,829 people have so far been registered for receiving the inoculation.
On 7 February, the countrywide Covid-19 vaccination campaign began with spontaneous participation of all levels of people for receiving vaccines from 1,055 designated hospitals.
As of 1 July, a total of 58,20,015 people received first shot of Covid-19 vaccines while 42,89,913 got second dose of the jab.