Muscat: More than 1 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines will arrive in Oman before the end of June, the Minister of Health said on Wednesday.
His Excellency Dr. Ahmed bin Mohammad Al-Saeedi, Minister of Health, said in an interview with Oman TV on Wednesday evening that: "Since the start of the production of vaccines, the Sultanate has focused on companies that have had a long history of producing vaccines and have booked vaccinations sufficient for 60% of the population of the Sultanate."
The Minister of Health confirmed that: "The Sultanate was among first countries to join the international coalition that includes 190 countries and was reliant on the coalition to obtain hundreds of millions of vaccination doses and distribute them in a fair way to countries so that each country will initially vaccinate 20 percent of workers in the health sector or other sectors, the elderly and those with chronic diseases."
Al-Saeedi also said:" The world was distributed to production areas and the Sultanate was placed with many countries from the production of AstraZenka in Russia, and it was delayed for more than 4 months. It was hoped that thousands of doses would arrive in January and the doses would follow, but this did not happen, while one of the companies was regular in supplying were 265,000 doses have reached the Sultanate last Saturday, and those who were vaccinated until yesterday evening reached 174 thousand."
Al-Saeedi emphasized that:" The vaccine doses have been reserved for the Sultanate of 6 million within a certain time frame, stressing that the problem is not in the financial situation as it has been rumored, and not even political relations, as the Sultanate has good political relations. The Sultanate paid to the International coalition for 10% of the doses in October 2020."
"The delay in vaccinations is due to the expectation of some companies that the production rate will be higher than they are capable of, and some companies have faced difficulties in clinical trials and were delayed, and some companies in the final stages of clinical trials did not prove the effectiveness or safety of the vaccine and they withdrew from the market."
Al-Saeedi said that: "we will not authorize any medical product until safety and efficacy are assured."
His Excellency confirmed that:" there are 4,750,000 doses from one company which is Pfizer, that will be supplied to the Sultanate before the end of September, of which approximately 1,350,000 will be supplied before the end of June, and negotiations are still underway to obtain 250,000 doses this month."
Al-Saeedi indicated that: "More than 90 percent of workers in the health sector in the Sultanate have been vaccinated, and before the beginning of the next academic year, all teaching bodies, college students and students over 18 years will be vaccinated, and then workers in government units will be vaccinated according to age groups and to risk factors for the disease. "
His Excellency stressed that: "Vaccination does not protect 100% and there are cases that have been vaccinated and infected."
