Several districts in Sindh Province are facing severe shortages of vaccines due to the interruption of central supply

Due to the interruption of the vaccine supply at the center, several vaccination centers in Sindh province, including Hyderabad, had to be temporarily closed due to vaccine shortages.

According to the Ministry of Health of Sindh Province, 40% of vaccination centers in Hyderabad and parts of Lower Sindh had to be temporarily closed due to insufficient vaccine stocks.

At the same time, the remaining vaccination centers only provide convenience for those who come to get the second dose of vaccine.

According to the Sindh Ministry of Health, the federal government is facing a shortage of vaccines because the federal government has not yet delivered vaccines to the province, adding that the new stocks are expected to arrive on June 20.

District health officials said that in Hyderabad, 21 vaccination centers have run out of vaccine stocks.

Logistics, coordination challenges disrupt Pakistan’s vaccine supply

Due to lack of coordination between government agencies and supply disruptions from China, Pakistan faced a shortage of COVID-19 vaccines on Tuesday.

Federal officials said that the task of purchasing vaccines has been assigned to the National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA), and the Ministry of Health has exempted this responsibility. As a result, while the supply of vaccines in China that caused the crisis was interrupted, there was also a lack of coordination.

Officials said that NDMA is not only dealing with Chinese vaccine manufacturers, including Sinopharm, Kexing and CansinoBIO, but also negotiating with Pfizer to purchase its mRNA vaccine for the country, and the deal has not yet been reached.

Similarly, they said that Pakistan is heavily dependent on the Islamabad National Institutes of Health (NIH) to prepare and file a single-dose Chinese vaccine Cansino from bulk concentrates distributed under the name of PakVac, but NIH has also failed to fulfill its commitment to continuously supply single-dose vaccines. .

“The National Institutes of Health Islamabad has promised that they will provide 3 million doses of PakVac (Cansino) vaccine per month, but they have failed to deliver on their promise,” one of the officials said.

At the beginning, the Pakistani government vaccinated people with a double dose of the national medicine vaccine from China, followed by AstraZeneca from the United Kingdom, and then chose SinoVac from China and Cansino with a single injection.

The National Command and Operations Center (NCOC) has received 100,000 doses of Pfizer vaccine and has provided 26,000 doses of vaccines to Punjab. These vaccines will be given priority to people with weakened immune functions, such as organ transplantation, cancer and AIDS patients.

When contacted, a spokesperson for the Ministry of National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination said that vaccine shortages have spread across the country. Therefore, he suggested the need to relocate the vaccine from the limited-use CVC.

He further said that the number of vaccines in centralized reserves is limited. “It is expected that the next batch of vaccines will end this weekend,” he told the news.

Pakistan’s vaccine supply will improve when more doses arrive after June 20: Dr. Faisal Sultan

Dr. Faisal Sultan, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister’s National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination, said on Wednesday that the government is making sincere efforts to ensure that all vaccination centers have access to the COVID-19 vaccine, and more doses are expected soon The vaccine is available.

In a media briefing, Dr. Sudan said that so far, 20 million citizens have been vaccinated because the government received sufficient doses in June to strengthen the country’s vaccination efforts.

He refuted the rumors that the vaccines were used up in Pakistan as “rumors” and said that the shortage of vaccines is a “global phenomenon”. He said that after June 20, Pakistan’s vaccine situation will improve, and more vaccines will arrive in Pakistan by then.

It is not clear which vaccines will be available at that time.

He said the government is liaising with local and provincial governments to make up for the shortage. “We are doing load balancing and redistribution locally to manage the situation across the country.”

Dr. Faisal said: “We have two million doses available, and vaccination will continue to protect our citizens from the coronavirus.”

The prime minister’s health assistant said that it would be no harm if the second dose of vaccine was postponed by six to eight weeks instead of the regular three to four week interval.

He advised citizens to strictly abide by COVID-19 Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) in offices and markets to prevent this disease.

“COVID-19 is a deadly virus, but we can control it like we followed the SoP during the first and second wave to control it.”

He said the government is seeking full cooperation to comply with the SoP. “By taking preventive measures, we can save precious lives, including the lives of our dear ones. Wear masks, maintain social distancing, wash hands frequently with soap, and avoid crowded places.”