South Sudan to receive second batch of COVID-19 vaccine next month

JUBA – South Sudan will receive its second batch of COVID-19 vaccine doses in August, according to health authorities.

Dr. John Rumunu, Head of Health Services at the Ministry of Health disclosed that 60,000 AstraZeneca vaccines will arrive in the country on the first week of August from the COVAX facility.

“We expect the next batch to arrive in the first week of August. The 60,000 doses will come from the COVAX facility,” Rumunu told reporters during the routine Sunday weekly briefing on COVID-19 at Emergency Operation Center (EOP) in Juba.

The health expert revealed that the country has so far administered more than 50,778 vaccines.

The world’s youngest nation has a population of 13 million.

“We have deployed over 50,778 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines across the country, the first dose account for 47, 37 and the second dose is 3, 741,” he told reporters in Juba.

In March, the country received 132,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine from the Covax facility and another consignment of 59,000 doses from the African Union (AU) and South African telecom giant, MTN.

But the 59,000 doses donated by the AU could not be used as they expired on 13 April before the country could start a vaccine rollout.

Also, the African youngest nation donated 72,000 doses to Kenya after concluding it cannot administer the jabs before they expire on 18^th July.

“The 72,000 doses that were returned to the COVAX facility is burned, I mean, we have put the doses in the poor and we are getting this 60,000 from the pool,” he said.

He sounded optimistic that the country will administered the remaining 9,222 doses before the expiry on 18^th July.

“In terms of whether or not we will finish the remaining vaccines before the expiry, of course, there is no doubt that we are going to finish it because the current daily yield is above 1000,” he said.

“The first batch of the vaccine is expiring on 18 July. We are remaining 9,222 doses and we have like 14 days remaining for the vaccines to expire,” he added.