Grenada on Wednesday received 1,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine, which will be administered primarily to frontline workers.
Prime Minister Dr the Right Honourable Keith Mitchell, Health Minister Honourable Nickolas Steele and other senior health officials will be among the first to receive the vaccine. The Ministry of Health has created a Covid-19 Vaccination Plan which identifies the order of priority for persons to receive the vaccine.
The AstraZeneca vaccine is manufactured in India. Wednesday’s shipment was made available through the coordination of Prime Minister Mia Mottley of Barbados who coordinated the delivery of some of her country’s first batch of vaccines to Grenada and other OECS countries. The shipment was transported by the Regional Security System (RSS) plane.
Another 5,000 doses of the vaccine are expected to arrive this week, followed by another 40,000 within the first quarter.
The Minister anticipates that up to 60,000 Grenadians will be able to receive the vaccine during the course of this year. Minister Steele has described this particular vaccine as one of the front-runners among those already produced and has been approved for use in the United Kingdom and the European Union. The vaccine, which does not require extreme cold storage, also meets the criteria that Grenada has identified for selection.
The receiving party included Acting Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health Dr Francis Martin, Acting Chief Medical Officer Dr Shawn Charles, and Dr George Mitchell, a member of the Covid-19 Response Committee.
Dr Martin described it as a pivotal moment in Grenada’s fight against Covid-19, noting that the vaccination of residents will enable the country to gradually return to some sense of normalcy. Dr Mitchell added that by public health standards, vaccination has saved the most lives and this is in no way different to what is expected of the Covid-19 vaccination process.
The Acting Chief Medical Officer has confirmed that Grenada has the capacity to receive the various vaccines, including the Pfizer vaccine which requires cold chain storage.
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