COVID-19 vaccination will begin on Monday in 13 Vietnamese provinces and cities which recently recorded local infections, including Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

According to a decision signed by Deputy Minister of Health Truong Quoc Cuong on Saturday, the 117,600 COVID-19 vaccine doses that Vietnam currently has will be distributed to 13 provinces and cities where community-based cases have been documented lately.

The northern province of Hai Duong, the largest COVID-19 hotbed, will receive 32,000 doses, while Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City will each get 8,000 shots.

About 1,200 to 3,800 doses will be allocated to each of the ten remaining localities, namely Quang Ninh, Hai Phong, Bac Ninh, Hoa Binh, Hung Yen, Bac Giang, Gia Lai, Ha Giang, Binh Duong, and Dien Bien.

The Ministry of Public Security and Ministry of National Defense will be supplied with a combined 30,000 jabs.

Twenty-one hospitals and medical centers which are providing treatment for COVID-19 patients across the country will also have access to the vaccine doses.

Among them, the Ho Chi Minh City Hospital for Tropical Diseases will get 900 shots, while the National Hospital for Tropical Diseases Branch No. 2 in Hanoi will receive 450 doses.

About 600 shots will be kept at the Institute of Vaccines and Medical Biologicals in Khanh Hoa Province for quality control and sample storage.

The Expanded Program on Immunization under the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology will be in charge of receiving and transporting the vaccine doses to vaccination establishments listed by the health ministry.

People belonging to target groups listed in Government Resolution No. 21 will be the first to receive vaccination in the said localities and medical facilities.

The Ministry of Public Security and Ministry of National Defense will proactively receive and allocate the vaccine doses to the prioritized officers in their units.

All of these vaccine shots were developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, Duong Thi Hong – head of the Expanded Program on Immunization – said, adding that each person will receive two jabs with an interval of 12 weeks.

The inoculation will be carried out by trained personnel at designated establishments, with each vaccination session including less than 100 people.

Those who will be vaccinated are people over 18 years old, including the elderly and people with chronic illnesses, Hong added.

Vietnam previously received its first COVID-19 vaccine shipment on February 24 – a batch of 117,600 doses of COVID-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford.

The country is working with the COVAX scheme, co-led by WHO, to have access to approximately 1.3 million doses within March, Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long said at a teleconference on Saturday.

Vietnam aims to obtain 90 million COVID-19 vaccine doses by the end of the year, including 30 million through the COVAX scheme, 30 million through AstraZeneca, and the rest through negotiations with U.S. producers.

A total of 2,509 COVID-19 cases have been recorded in Vietnam as of Sunday morning, with 1,920 recoveries and 35 deaths.

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