Bangladesh receives first shipment of imported COVID vaccine doses

The first shipment of five million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, imported from India, has arrived in Dhaka.

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 25 Jan 2021, 06:45 AM
Updated : 25 Jan 2021, 07:23 AM

An Air India flight carrying the vaccine shots landed in Dhaka around 11:15 am on Monday.

Nine refrigerated vans will carry the vaccine doses to a warehouse in Tongi on the outskirts of Dhaka, Nazmul Hassan, managing director of Beximco Pharmaceuticals, the distributor of the vaccines, said on Monday.

Beximco will send the doses to different districts in four to five days for distribution, subject to approval from the government, he said.

“Samples from every vaccine batch will be sent to the government's drug-testing laboratories and the testing will take 48 hours.”

On Nov 5, Bangladesh signed a deal with Serum Institute of India for the procurement of 30 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. Serum Institute will supply five million doses each month.

Bangladesh is now set to kick off its coronavirus vaccination campaign by inoculating a nurse on Jan 27 after receiving two million free doses of the COVID-19 vaccine from India.

Around 400-500 people will get the first vaccine shots on Jan 27-28. The nationwide vaccination will begin on Feb 8.