Friday Nov 22, 2024
Friday Nov 22, 2024
Wednesday, 9 June 2021 00:13 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Sri Lanka today received one million doses of Sinopharm and will be receiving 65,000 doses of Sputnik V by the end of the week.
As such, the country has received two million of the 13 million doses of the Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine Sri Lanka has ordered from the vaccine manufacturer. The country also received a donation of 1.1 million doses from China.
Regarding the Sputnik V doses expected by the end of the week, State Minister of Pharmaceutical Production, Supply and Regulation Prof. Channa Jayasumana in Parliament said: “We will receive 65,000 Sputnik V vaccine doses on Friday. Of this, 15,000 are second dose vaccines. We will provide these to the Gothatuwa MOH and the remaining 50,000 vaccines will be used to carry out the remainder of the immunisation program in the Kandy District.”
He added that a request had been made to the United States of America that the vaccines allocated for Sri Lanka through the US global vaccine sharing initiative are AstraZeneca vaccines, as the country is in need of 600,000 doses of the vaccine to administer the second dose to persons. However, the US had informed Sri Lanka yesterday that either Moderna or Johnson and Johnson vaccines would be sent.
Meanwhile, the Epidemiology Unit states that COVID-19 vaccines were administered to 20,054 persons on Monday, bringing the number of persons to receive the first dose of a vaccine to 1,979,802 and the second dose of a vaccine to 353,789.
On Monday, the first dose of Sinopharm was administered to 19,567 persons and a total of 989,574 persons have received the first dose of Sinopharm. Administration of the second dose commenced yesterday.
The second dose of AstraZeneca was administered to 487 persons on Monday and the second dose has been administered to 353,789 persons in total, while the first dose has been administered to 925,242 persons. Regarding an incident that occurred in Galle two days ago, where the second dose of AstraZeneca was allegedly administered to persons, Health Ministry Media Spokesperson Dr. Hemantha Herath stated that the Health Ministry will look into the incident and take necessary action if guidelines were not being followed.
He explained that an extremely limited quantity of AstraZeneca vaccines was remaining and that administration takes place as per recommendations of the Epidemiology Unit.
In addition to AstraZeneca and Sinopharm, the Sputnik V vaccine is also being administered in Sri Lanka and 64,986 persons have received the first dose of the vaccine.
