By Elishya Perera
DHAKA, Bangladesh (CWBN)_The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the health regulatory and research institute in the United States, says that it is willing to offer its expertise on prioritising recipients of the first doses of the COVID-19 vaccines in Bangladesh, since the issue may become a major challenge for the Asian country in the coming days.
CDC’s country director in Dhaka, Dr Michael Friedman, said it was imperative for Bangladesh to prepare a vaccine-recipient list for the first round of doses, since its assumable that Bangladesh would find it difficult to purchase more than one million doses in the first six months after a potential vaccine candidate becomes available globally.
He also pointed out that Bangladesh has never carried out any adult immunisation programme despite its success in vaccinating children. “Vaccination in children and adult is not the same,” he said, adding that immunization of a large number of adults will be quite challenging.
According to Friedman, healthcare workers should be among the group who receives the first doses of the vaccine, followed by “essential security personnel” and key policymakers.
The US public health expert said the world requires over 15 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to administer at least two doses of a particular vaccine for the entire global population.
On the other hand, three of the most promising vaccine candidates being produced in the US have a production capacity to cover less than 10 per cent of the global population, in the first six months following approval.
Accordingly, Friedman suggested that Bangladesh considers potential Russian and Chinese vaccines candidates for its most vulnerable population, since majority of the world population might otherwise have to wait for a year to get vaccinated.
It is reported that Bangladesh has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Serum Institute of India for priority delivery of 30 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation also recommends that once a COVID-19 vaccine is proven to be safe and effective, all countries should receive doses in proportion to the size of their population.
