Bangladesh rolls out the first batch of Pfizer vaccine doses

Bangladesh has begun to administer the first doses of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, which were sent under the global sharing platform COVAX.

As many as 360 people received the vaccine at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University Hospital, Sheikh Russel National Gastroliver Institute and Kurmitola General Hospital in a dry-run on Monday.

The vaccinations began at 9 am and ended at 2 pm.

The Pfizer doses will be given mass vaccination approval after observing the participants of the dry-run for seven to 10 days, according to the Directorate General of Health Services.

Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine is the third approved in Bangladesh to prevent the spread of coronavirus infections. At least 24 people took the jab at BSMMU by 11 am on Monday, while 120 people have registered there to receive it.

Rahat Chowdhury, a resident of Malibagh, was the first to get the Pfizer shot. He initially had no interest in taking the vaccine and by the time he registered in April, new doses were no longer available.

"I consider myself lucky as I received the SMS to come and get the Pfizer,” he said. “I was the first to get it, and I feel fine. I would like to tell everyone to get their jab as well."

Harunur Rashid from Jigatala came to BSMMU to get the COVID-19 vaccine. He had registered to get the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, but had to defer it after contracting COVID-19. By the time he recovered, the vaccination programme was halted as the AstraZeneca doses had run out. “I took the Pfizer vaccine today and feel nothing unusual."

No issues were reported in administering the Pfizer vaccine, said Meerjady Sabrina Flora, additional director-general of DGHS, after visiting BSMMU.

Maintaining a proper storage temperature is important for the Pfizer vaccine and the doses need to be mixed properly and carefully, she said.

For now, everything was going well, said Dr Flora.

“Health workers have been trained to administer the vaccine doses and they are working accordingly. None of the recipients has complained. We need to wait to see any side-effect of the vaccine.”

“We chose the hospitals with ICU services as the first vaccine centres as we are administering the Pfizer vaccine for the first time.”

Health workers are preparing to administer the first doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University on Monday, Jun 21, 2021. Photo: Mahmud Zaman Ovi

The government has not prepared any priority list for people to get the Pfizer vaccine, but migrant workers may be considered for the first ones, Dr Flora said.

Bangladesh recently began administering 500,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine, sent by China as a gift, to students and doctors of medical colleges. The vaccine was also made available to the frontline workers in the fight against the coronavirus.

The government resumed another phase of inoculations with the Chinese vaccine across the country on Saturday.

The country rolled out the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine by administering the first dose to a nurse at the Kurmitola General Hospital on Jan 27. The mass vaccination drive was launched on Feb 7 after observation of the participants of the trial.

With the stock of the vaccine exhausted, Bangladesh is using the vaccine developed by China's state company Sinopharm in the inoculation drive. The second phase of the mass inoculation programme with the Sinopharm doses began at 67 centres across the country on Saturday.

China sent 1.1 million shots as a gift on May 12 and Jun 13.  The government received 100,620 Pfizer doses under the global COVID vaccine-sharing platform co-led by the World Health Organisation on May 31.