Despite all-out efforts to get AstraZeneca vaccine doses to meet the immediate need of those yet to get their second dose, there is no concrete outcome yet.
Apart from India, Bangladesh reached out to the United States and United Kingdom to get the AstraZeneca vaccine doses as 1.5 million people who have received their first AstraZeneca jabs are unlikely to get their second dose if the government does not receive vaccine doses from the countries it approached including those from COVAX facility.
Asked whether Bangladesh is getting AstraZeneca vaccine doses soon from the US, a spokesperson at the US Embassy in Dhaka said the US President reaffirmed that commitment by announcing that the US will provide 80 million doses of vaccine to support global needs by the end of June.
But there is nothing specific yet on how many doses Bangladesh will get or when.
“Weare working to provide the 80 million doses in the near future and are evaluating the supply and will then make a determination on distribution,” he told UNB. But Bangladesh informally came to know that Bangladesh is not in the priority lists as the US does not see any crisis in Bangladesh considering the low number of deaths and cases.
The US Embassy spokesperson said the United States is committed to leading the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Our overarching aim is to?end the pandemic as quickly as possible, and that requires getting as many people vaccinated as fast as possible,” he said.
In addition to distributing the 80 million doses of vaccine, the United States is the largest single donor to the global vaccine initiative, COVAX, with $2 billion already donated and plans to provide another $2 billion through 2022.
