Bangladesh will receive 45 lakh doses of Covid-19 vaccine from COVAX facility and China within the next couple of days.
Twenty-five lakh doses of Moderna Covid-19 vaccine under COVAX facility will arrive in Dhaka on Friday and Saturday in two separate consignments.
On the other hand, Bangladesh will receive two consignments of commercially purchased Sinopharm vaccine doses — 11 lakh and 9 lakh — in the next two days.
Health Minister Zahid Maleque shared the updates in a video message on Thursday.
“Around 12 lakh vaccine doses will reach Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport around 11:20 pm on Friday and the rest on Saturday,” said the minister.
The minister will be present at the airport on Friday.
Earlier, Deputy Chief of Mission at Chinese Embassy in Dhaka Hualong Yan said the first consignment of 2 million doses of vaccine as part of Bangladesh government’s commercial purchase from China’s Sinopharm are ready for delivery in Beijing.
“China stands by our Bangladeshi friends in fighting the new wave of the pandemic,” he said.
Bangladesh is likely to get 1.5 crore of Sinopharm vaccine doses from China while China says it is ready to supply more, if needed.
Earlier, US Ambassador to Bangladesh Earl Miller tweeted saying Bangladesh will soon receive a gift of 2.5 million doses of Moderna Covid-19 vaccine from the American people via GAVI.
“As the largest contributor to COVAX, the U.S. is committed to increasing the country’s vaccine supply to beat the pandemic here and worldwide.” Ambassador Miller said.
Bangladesh entered into a deal with the Serum Institute of India (SII) to purchase 30 million doses of a potential vaccine being developed by AstraZeneca for Covid-19.
Source: United News of Bangladesh