Moudud Ahmmed Sujan

Over 13,000 people have registered online for inoculation against Covid-19 as of yesterday noon, according to the Directorate General of Health Services.

Top health official Prof Nasima Sultana, who was inoculated on Wednesday, said she was feeling very well and had been working as usual at office and home.

Runu Veronica Costa, a senior nurse of Kurmitola General Hospital, yesterday received the first vaccine shot as Bangladesh joined the world in the Covid-19 vaccination campaign.

The government has almost completed the groundwork for rolling out Covid-19 vaccine in the country early next month.

As the government is preparing to vaccinate millions of people across the country, likely from February 8, with the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, many people are indecisive due to fears of possible side effects.

Piloting of the government’s Covid-19 inoculation programme will launch on Wednesday through vaccinating a nurse at the capital’s Kurmitola General Hospital.

The government is yet to finalise the list of healthcare professionals and volunteers to be part of the Covid-19 mass inoculation campaign, whose piloting is likely to begin later this week.

The government is likely to start piloting the Covid-19 vaccination from next week with the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines obtained from the Indian government, doses of which are expected to arrive in Dhaka tomorrow.

Bangladesh will receive 20 lakh doses of Covishield as a gift from india tomorrow, said a high official with knowledge of the development.

The government may allow human trial of three vaccine candidates in the country to enhance the possibility of getting more Covid vaccines, say officials.

Covid-19 vaccination would start from the first week of February.

The government yesterday approved for emergency use Covishield, the Indian version of the Oxford-AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine.

The government will inoculate in phases nearly 14 crore people against Covid-19 with double-dose vaccine from the COVAX facility under a Tk 6,786 crore pandemic preparedness project.

The BSMMU authorities are considering approving Chinese pharma Anhui Zhifei’s proposal for the third phase trial of its Covid-19 vaccine.

“Today we are unable to say what we had been saying until now. We have found three patients...” These were the words of the then IEDCR director Prof Meerjady Sabrina Flora on March 8 after the first detection of coronavirus cases in Bangladesh, which changed everything, most probably forever.

Experts have anticipated that coronavirus infections will spike in late January and early February and urged people to abide by the rules and avoid “super spreader events” at all costs.

Almost a year after harmful heavy metals like cadmium, chromium and lead were found in dozens of pesticides, the government is yet to enforce mandatory tests to prevent imports of the adulterated chemicals, widely used in the country’s vast agriculture sector.

Scientists in Bangladesh have reported a new Covid-19 strain, which is a bit similar to the one found in the UK recently.

Air travellers from the UK without Covid-19 negative certificates would be quarantined for seven days.

Bangladesh will get six crore shots of Covid-19 vaccines between May and June next year from the COVAX facility, Cabinet Secretary Khandker Anwarul Islam said yesterday.