Gov’t To Source Four Million Doses of Vaccines By March 2022

Minister of Health and Wellness, Dr. the Hon. Christopher Tufton, says the Government plans to identify and source a total of four million doses of vaccines by March 2022.

He said that the four million doses will inoculate at least 65 per cent of the Jamaican population against the coronavirus (COVID-19).

 “We are in very advanced discussions with some other potential sources, but I prefer not to say the details on those until we have a contract in hand and we know that those vaccines are scheduled to come to the country. But the objective is to get to four million doses by March 2022,” Dr. Tufton said. 

He was addressing the weekly COVID Conversations press briefing on Tuesday (March 2). The first set of vaccines, from India, are scheduled to arrive on the island this Thursday (March 4).

            “The Government of India has generously donated some 50,000 vaccines… so we anticipate that to represent the first delivery of vaccines to our country and we look forward to that,” Dr. Tufton said.

            The Ministry of Health and Wellness also expects some 14,400 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines on or before March 11, which will represent the second shipment. 

Another 1.8 million doses are to be supplied to Jamaica, starting in April, under the African Medical Supply platform.

Over the last 24 hours, there were 239 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and seven deaths. Jamaica now has some 22,265 confirmed cases of COVID-19.