In expanding the Covid-19 vaccination programme the government will start giving the jabs to the city’s slum dwellers from Tuesday, Health Minister Zahid Maleque has said.
The drive will start from Korail slum, home of about three lakh people, the minister told a programme at Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons in city’s Mohakhali on Monday.
Zahid said that even though Bangladesh has been able to bring the Covid fatality rate under control, the rate of infections is still increasing. “We want to bring the deaths and cases to zero level,” he said.
He said already 5 crore people have received the first dose of vaccine while 3 crore people have been fully vaccinated. Some 15 lakh people are taking the Covid jabs daily on average and the government has a plan to jab 3 crore people this month.
Covid jabs for city’s slum dwellers start on Tuesday: Health Minister
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“We have 2.75 crore vaccines of Pfizer, Moderna and Sinopharm in stock and we are trying to produce vaccines in the country,” he said.
Bangladesh recorded four more Covid-linked deaths and 234 fresh infections in 24 hours until Monday morning.
The daily-case positivity rate slightly increased to 1.32 per cent from Sunday’s 1.14 per cent.
The fresh numbers took the total fatalities to 27,926 while the country’s caseload mounted to 15,72,735, said the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
Source: United News of Bangladesh