By James Okello
Uganda is left with only 20,000 vaccine doses as the second wave of the Coronavirus disease hits upwards of 137% case increase rate of spread.
Dr. Diana Atwiine, the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Health in Uganda says the countries of the northern hemisphere are hording the vaccines which are badly needed to replenish stocks in the poor countries of the South.
“We live in the world of inequalities and we are seeing this in vaccine distribution. Countries that would support that would come to rescue of developing countries and chose to horde vaccines,” she told CNN this week.
Diana says she is not sure when the rest of the country will be vaccinated becauee the country doesn’t have the vaccines and even when they want to buy them they are not available.
Uganda received the first batch of AstraZeneca vaccine in March and is said to be running out very fast. This comes at a time when there is increased demand for the vaccines across the country as Covid-19 cases and hospitalisation rise. Many vaccine recipients are also due for the second round.
Dr. Alfred Driwale, the country’s head of immunisation programme, last Thursday said some districts such as Mbale have already depleted their stock.
“As the vaccines get exhausted, we are going to start communicating to leaders to demobilise people until we get the next consignment. When we started the vaccination exercise, we could vaccinate a total of 45,000 people per week,” Dr Driwale said as reported by Daily Monitor newspaper.
As part of efforts to curb the resurgence, President Yoweri Museveni announced a range of measures that included closing all schools and halting public gatherings. A 42-day restriction on movements was announced and is in effect.