2 million targeted in new vaccine drive
Published:Friday | February 19, 2021 | 12:20 AMJanet Silvera/Senior Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
In a radical shift from a moderate inoculation plan, the Jamaican Government will now purchase 3.5 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines at a cost of $5 billion to immunise two million citizens in 2021.
Originally, the Government had announced that only 16 per cent of the population, or around 450,000 people, would be vaccinated by year end.
The about-turn comes as the island records a 100 per cent increase in active cases in two weeks and a death rate of 1.9 per cent. There are currently more than 7,000 active cases, but Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton cautioned that the real numbers could be close to 60,000.
Overall infections have topped 20,000. There have been 384 deaths.
Referencing the race by developed countries to hoard millions of doses for their own populations, the health minister said the Jamaican Government was working to maximise its procurement of the jab.
“The wealthier countries have been buying up blocks of vaccines, poorer countries not having access, countries committing to purchase but not having the vaccine, and some buying for two to three times their population,” he said, citing a World Health Organization concern.
Tufton reasserted that the island had expanded its scope beyond the COVAX Facility and was in “discussions with AstraZeneca and the Sirum Institute of India, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, and the African Medical Supplies platform through CARICOM”.
In the meantime, Jamaica’s persistent daily positivity rate of more than 20 per cent continues to be a source of concern.
The parish of St James was cited as a centre of coronavirus spread.
St Catherine, St James, Manchester, and St Catherine have particularly high mortality rates, National Epidemiologist Dr Karen Webster Kerr revealed.