Uganda has received an additional 586,080 Covid-19 vaccine doses. The doses include 300,000 Sinovac vaccine doses donated by the Chinese government and the rest are AstraZeneca vaccine doses from the Norwegian government through the Covax facility.
This brings the total number of vaccine doses received to 1.7 million doses through COVAX, and directly from the governments of India and China.
The latest batch of vaccine doses was received on Saturday by Dr Ruth Aceng, the minister of health at head offices of National Medical Stores-NMS in Entebbe.
The government targets to vaccinate 22 million people, mainly health workers, teachers, people with underlying conditions such as diabetes, hypertension and the elderly.
Dr Aceng lauded the donors for their support towards the country’s fight against Covid-19. She noted that over one million people have been vaccinated of which 240,771 people have received their second dose.
Dr Aceng says the vaccination exercise is expected to resume next week after NMS has delivered the doses to various districts.
The NMS General Manager Moses Kamabare noted that distribution of the vaccines will commence as soon as NMS receives the distribution list from the health ministry.
Aceng also said that the Vaccination Advisory Committee opposes the mixing of vaccines. She added that they are yet to decide on the distribution of the Sinovac vaccine and who will receive it.
-URN
