Guyana yesterday received 83,000 more doses of Sputnik V vaccines to continue ongoing efforts to immunise the population against COVID-19.
The Ministry of Health reported that the third batch of the Russian vaccines arrived in the country at the Cheddi Jagan Inter-national Airport yesterday morning. According to the Minister of Health Dr Frank Anthony, this is part of the 200,000 doses that the Government of Guyana has purchased from Russia.
“The vaccines are going to come in tranches and as they come we will continue the distribution. Our plan has been and continues to be that we are securing vaccines for every single adult in Guyana,” Anthony said during his COVID-19 update yesterday. He noted that while the government seeks to secure vaccines for everyone, getting vaccinated remains voluntary.
Meanwhile, he added, “We have received the first shipment of those first doses and today we will be receiving 43,000 of the first dose so that would complement what we have received as first dose and we will be getting 40,000 of the second dose so that those persons who would require their second dose we would have their second dose ready”.
So far, Guyana has received 3,000 AstraZeneca vaccines from Bar-bados, 20,000 Sinopharm shots from China and 80,000 AstraZeneca vaccines from India, all through donations. (Some 5,000 vaccines from tranche donated by India were later donated to Barbados). Some 55,000 doses of Sputnik V vaccines which were purchased by the government later arrived in the country followed by 24,000 doses of AstraZeneca from COVAX. With the most recent arrival of the Sputnik V shots, which happens to be the single largest shipment to date, some 130,000 persons will be fully inoculated.
Anthony indicated that since the expansion of the access to vaccines to include all eligible adults, there has been a good response from the younger population. This, he said, is good as younger persons have been getting sick lately.
“When we look at the profile of the persons who are getting sick, we have seen a lot of younger persons between the ages of 20 [and] 35 where we have recorded the most cases both for males and females and so these vaccines are certainly going to help to protect them,” he noted.
He announced that as of Sunday a total of 86,601 persons have been vaccinated across the country as he added that over the weekend there were a number of outreach teams in all the regions working to get vaccines out to the various communities.
