Second dose now after 8 weeks
The government has reverted to its original plan of administering the second dose of Covid-19 vaccine eight weeks after the first jab instead of the gap of four weeks between the two doses.
It has also decided to inoculate 70 lakh people in the first phase instead of 35 lakh.
The National Immunisation Technical Advisory Committee meeting took these decisions on Saturday.
The decisions were taken in the light of a strong response from people to get inoculated against Covid-19, as well as assurances of getting the second consignment of vaccines on time.
"The national committee has suggested administering the second dose after eight weeks instead of four weeks and we agreed on it. We have the liberty to customise our procedure according to requirements," ABM Khurshid Alam, director general of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), told The Daily Star yesterday.
He also said 70 lakh jabs will be administered in the first phase but could not say when exactly the phase would end as it depends on the people's response.
Those who have already received the first dose of the vaccine and got the date for the second dose will be informed of the new date through SMS, the DG said.
Last week, AstraZeneca said the key to the success of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine is a longer gap between the two doses.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) also recommended extending the gap between the first and second doses to improve efficacy.
"In light of the observation that the two-dose efficacy and immunogenicity increase with a longer inter-dose interval, WHO recommends an interval of eight to 12 weeks between the doses," it said.
DGHS had thought of administering the second dose within a month of the first fearing the expiry of the three batches of vaccines currently in the country as people were initially skeptical about vaccination and the response was poor.
The government had a stock of 70 lakh doses of three different batches. Shots from two of the batches will expire in April while those of the other in June this year.
Initially the government planned to inoculate 60 lakh people in the first month. But later, the government reduced the number to 35 lakh due to a lukewarm response to online registration. The mass inoculation campaign began on February 7.
Till Monday night, around 11,32,711 lakh people had been given the shots and the number of those who did the registration on www.surokkha.gov.bd reached around 20 lakh.
The authorities also introduced on-spot registration and inoculation, but stopped it later after receiving a good response to the online registration.
Nazmul Hassan Papon, managing director of Beximco Pharmaceuticals, yesterday said some 20-30 lakh more doses of Covid-19 vaccine will arrive in Bangladesh from Serum Institute of India on February 22. The rest will arrive gradually, he added.
Bangladesh got 50 lakh doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine from SII on January 25. The government purchased three crore shots of the Oxford vaccine from SII. As per the contract, Bangladesh will get 50 lakh doses every month.
The country has also received 20 lakh doses of the Oxford vaccine as a gift from the Indian government.
Besides, The Covax programme, led by the World Health Organisation and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, has committed to give Bangladesh a total of 6.8 crore vaccine shots.
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