To ensure fair access to vaccines, Sri Lanka and Nepal have accelerated their efforts to procure COVID–19 vaccines. To this end, on July 5, a consignment of Pfizer vaccines procured with funding from the World Bank arrived in Sri Lanka, the first batch of 800,000 doses to be delivered over the next few weeks. Similarly, from July 8, Nepal will receive Vero Cell vaccines manufactured by China’s Sinopharm procured under there terms of a non-disclosure agreement signed in June between Nepal and China.
World Bank-funded support to Sri Lanka
The World Bank (WB) has stated that a total of five million vaccines funded through its Sri Lanka COVID-19 Emergency Response and Health System Preparedness Project will be supplied to Sri Lanka by December 2021. The project is worth US$298 million, including US$80.5 million in vaccine support.
Stating that more vaccines are under review and will arrive by the end of the year, Faris H. Hadad-Zervos, WB Country Director for Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, said, “The delivery of this first batch of vaccines reflects the joint work of the government of Sri Lanka and its partners to ensure fair access to safe and effective vaccines for Sri Lankans.”
- The WB support is expected to help Sri Lanka’s public healthcare system withstand future shocks
- The support so far has helped to strengthen Sri Lanka’s testing capacity i.e., establishing molecular biology laboratories and providing essential laboratory and biomedical equipment
- The WB funds have also helped to provide essential supplies and services to 70 COVID-19 treatment centers
- New isolation units and ICU facilities have also been set up in secondary and tertiary hospitals
- Patient treatment capacity is expected to be improved through the planned district-level oxygen generating plants
No details known of Nepal’s agreement with China
The Ministry of Health and Population of Nepal announced that the supply of Vero Cell vaccines would start on July 8. However, since the procurement falls under the terms of a non-disclosure agreement, the Ministry could not specify the number of doses and the price per dose. However, taking to Twitter on July 4, Dr. Rajan Bhattarai, Foreign Affairs Advisor to the Prime Minister of Nepal, stated that the scheduled by Nepal Airlines Corporation flight would bring 4 million doses of vaccines from China.
Although Sri Lanka has successfully managed the pandemic, the country with a population of over 21 million now faces a third wave of COVID-19. Nepal, which is home to about 30 million people, has been badly hit by a second wave and has so far received a total of 4.2 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from China, India, and the COVAX facility.
