Doha: First batch of Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to arrive in the next ten days, said Dr Hamad Al Romaihi, Co-chairperson of the National Pandemic Preparedness Committee and Director of Health Protection and Communicable Diseases at the Ministry of Public Health.
He was addressing a televised press conference to announce latest development realetd to COVID-19 in the country.
Dr Al Romaihi also said that while the Moderna vaccine will be a very limited quantity but this is an encouraging development and can expect regular, larger deliveries of both Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines to arrive from early March.
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Main points from his presentation:
• Our vaccination campaign strategy will enable everyone who needs to be vaccinated to do so in 2021, but for now we must prioritize people most at risk from severe complications from the virus.
• Our strategy for the COVID vaccination campaign – the biggest vaccination campaign ever to be delivered in Qatar – is made up of four phases throughout 2021.
• Since the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic the Ministry of Public Health and key government partners have been closely working with several leading pharmaceutical companies around the world who were in advanced stages of developing vaccines against COVID-19.
• This proactive approach to securing a COVID-19 vaccine proved very effective and two agreements were signed – with Pfizer and BioNTech and Moderna.
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• The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was the first of these two be given FDA approval and on 21 December Qatar received its first shipment
• As with all countries across the world, we are currently faced with limited supplies of vaccines from Pfizer/BioNtech as they work to meet global demand.
• We have now received several shipments of Pfizer and BioNTech vaccines and we are due to receive weekly deliveries throughout February.
• In the next ten days we expect to receive the first delivery of Moderna vaccines. While this will be a very limited quantity, this is an encouraging development and we can expect regular, larger deliveries of both Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines to arrive from early March.
• From March onwards we will have significantly greater quantities of vaccines available to us and be able to greatly expand our output.
