KINSHASA, DR Congo
The Democratic Republic of Congo says it will return to the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) a total of 1.3 million doses of the 1.7 million it received, for redistribution to other African countries.
Susie Villeneuve, Unicef regional advisor for Health Systems
Strengthening in West and Central Africa, said the decision was made to ensure
usage of the vaccines before the expiry date on June 24.
The DRC has not issued a vaccination plan to support a campaign
of this scale and has an insufficient number of vaccination sites, which will
hinder “access to this vaccine,” the official said.
“Ghana, Senegal, Togo, Angola, Madagascar and the Comoros are
among the possible recipients of the Congolese lot,” Ms Villeneuve suggested
during a video conference in Ghana’s capital Accra on Tuesday.
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, vaccination operations
against Covid-19 have been slowing down since the official launch of the
campaign on April 19. In one week, only 1,700 people had received the first
dose, the Ministry of Health said.
AstraZeneca vaccines arrived in the DRC two months ago, but fear
of side effects had delayed their launch.
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