The administration of the second shot of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine to the about 400,000 people awaiting their second jab will start by Friday, August 27, this year, the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) Manager has said.

Dr. Kwame Amponsa-Achiano said the decision followed the arrival of the 249,600 doses of the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccine delivered under the COVAX facility, courtesy the United Kingdom (UK) government.

In an interview with the Daily Graphic in Accra yesterday, Dr. Amponsa-Achiano said priority would be given to those who took their first jab from March 10, this year and beyond.

That, he said, was because the last consignment of AstraZeneca that was deployed was targeted at those who took their first jab from March 1 to March 9, this year.

He explained that they were finalising the deployment plan for the recent AstraZeneca consignment and the plan would determine the exact day the exercise would start next week.

Dr. Amponsa-Achiano said the deployment would be done nationwide.

Johnson & Johnson

Providing updates on the 177,600 doses of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines which the government took delivery of on August 7, this year, Dr. Amponsa-Achiano said 150,000 were deployed to the 11 districts in Greater Kumasi and Greater Accra regions, considered hotspots of the virus.

He explained that 120,000 out of those deployed had been administered as of last Wednesday, adding that the exercise would end today.

Dr. Amponsa-Achiano said the remaining had been deployed to other regions with emerging hotspots.

The Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine were procured through the African Vaccine Acquisition Trust (AVAT).

Vaccine update

As of August 18, this year, 1,765,050 doses of vaccines had come into the country, out of which 1,566,450 were the AstraZeneca double-schedule vaccine.

Under the National Vaccine Deployment Plan (NVDP) for COVID-19, the government in February this year received the initial 600,000 doses of AstraZeneca Covishield under the COVAX facility.

In March, 366,850 doses of the Covishield came in.

In May, 350,000 Covishield doses were rechannelled from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) under the COVAX facility.

In March 2021, the country received Russia’s Sputnik V, the last but one doses of vaccines before the latest two arrivals of Johnson & Johnson a fortnight ago and 249,600 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last Wednesday.

Background

President Akufo-Addo in his 20th address to the nation on COVID-19 gave the assurance that the government would ensure that the COVID-19 vaccines deployed in the country were effective and safe.

According to him, the target was to vaccinate “the entire population, with an initial target of 20 million people”.

Although, the supply has encountered hitches, the Presidential Advisor on Health, Dr. Anthony Nsia-Asare, told Citi TV that the government was determined to achieve herd immunity of vaccinating at least 60 per cent of the population.