Region 10 brushing aside covid vaccines

LESS THAN 20 PERCENT of some 40,000 residents of Upper Demerara/Berbice (Region Ten) has been vaccinated so far according to Dr Ertenisa Hamilton, Director of Primary Healthcare Services, Ministry of Health.

Hamilton said it’s a tall convincing the hyper-skeptical population in the mineral-rich 17,040 km2 community to receive the jab essential for protection against the highly contagious COVID-19. The ministry’s health programmes, especially those requiring the use of medications, have run into constant brick walls when they reach the bauxite-mining community of Linden.  

With under 4,000 residents inoculated, the health ministry is worried residents’ persistent stubbornness will jeopardise the national thrust to beat the Corona virus which has killed more than 4 million worldwide and 499 in Guyana.

While the health ministry’s COVID-19 vaccination drive has been hobbled by residents’ tenacious doubts, more than 50 percent of the populations in the other nine regions has received the jab, Dr Hamilton said. She said MoH teams have embarked on a house-to-house programme in the Region to help boost the initiative.

The Primary Healthcare Director said the ministry is continuing its inoculation programme nationwide with the first and second doses of AstraZeneca, Sinopharm, and the Sputnik V injectants.

Meanwhile, Minister of Health, Dr. Frank Anthony said the country is expecting another shipment of COVID-19 vaccines later this month from the COVAX facility and the CARICOM/African Union agreement.  

During Tuesday’s COVID-19 Update, Dr Anthony told the nation, “As you know, the Government has bought vaccines…we are going to continue to receive the vaccines that we’ve bought from the UAE [United Arab Emirates]. We have also been working with COVAX to get vaccines.” 

“Guyana is one of those AMC (advance market commitment) countries, and COVAX has promised us that they will be sending additional vaccines to Guyana, sometime between…July and September,” the minister disclosed during the ministry’s update. 

Guyana has also purchased the Johnson and Johnson (J&J) vaccine, Anthony said, through a compact brokered with the African Union (AU). 

“So, we were required to pay for these vaccines which we did. And the latest information that we have is that they’ll be able to ship those vaccines to us in August,” Minister Anthony said.

Through the COVAX/AMC financial initiative, the world’s poor economies get access to COVID-19 vaccines.

Anthony promised to disclose the arrival dates “once they are confirmed,” the Department of Public Information (DPI), the state-controlled media entity said.  

“In January, Guyana received 24,000 COVID-19 vaccines through COVAX.  In May, another consignment of 38,400 vaccines arrived through the same arrangement. Government then purchased the Russian Sputnik V vaccine, followed by the Chinese-made Sinopharm vaccine,” DPI said.

And, “there has been an uptake in the AstraZeneca vaccine, with all first doses administered. Only second dose AstraZeneca remains in stock (and) Government has adequate AstraZeneca for the second doses,” Anthony assured in the DPI press release.