Bangladesh on Wednesday received over 8.05 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine from Japan and the United Kingdom under the Covax facility.
Japan provided 4,000,800 of the doses while the UK provided 4,055,000. The vaccines were handed over to Health Minister Zahid Maleque at the state guest house Padma.
Japanese Ambassador Ito Naoki and British High Commissioner Robert Chatterton Dickson were present at the event.
The health minister praised the Japan and UK governments for always standing beside Bangladesh during times of crisis.
“These vaccines will strengthen the health authorities to win the war against Covid,” he added.
According to the minister, the country has already vaccinated 32% of the overall target population.
“We have 45 million doses of vaccine on hand and administering booster doses will start within seven to 10 days,” he said.
“In terms of vaccinating people, Bangladesh is ahead of many countries. The covid situation is also much safer than many other countries as well. The infection and death rates are much lower at present,” the minister added.