Civil society groups and private sector leaders from home and abroad yesterday called for lifting the restrictions set in the WTO’s Trade-Related Intellectual Property (TRIP) rights and declaring Covid vaccine as public goods to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday said China will strive to provide 2 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to other countries in 2021, state broadcaster CCTV reported.

Germany, France and Israel will go ahead with plans to administer COVID-19 vaccine boosters, disregarding an appeal by the World Health Organisation to hold off until more people are vaccinated around the world.

Moderna said Thursday that protection from its Covid-19 vaccine remained strong for at least six months, and the variant-specific boosters shot it is testing generated a "robust" antibody response to Delta.

Bangladesh will receive another consignment of 34 lakh doses of Sinopharm vaccine next week, Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen said today.

Civil society groups and private sector leaders from home and abroad have called for lifting the restrictions set in the WTO’s Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights and declaring Covid-19 vaccine as public good to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

French President Emmanuel Macron said on his Instagram account on Thursday that it was likely that the elderly and vulnerable would need a third Covid-19 vaccine shot, and that France was working on rolling these out from September onwards.

Two staff nurses were withdrawn from the vaccination centre of Pabna General Hospital this morning, for allegedly pushing an empty syringe in the arm of a medical student yesterday.

The White House said on Wednesday it is prepared to provide Covid-19 booster shots, if needed, suggesting it would not heed a call by the World Health Organization to delay providing additional vaccinations.

A special Covid-19 mass inoculation drive, mainly aimed at vaccinating rural people at the union level, has suffered a major setback just days before it was scheduled to begin on Saturday.

The UK government announced Wednesday it will offer coronavirus vaccinations to all 16 and 17 year olds, but not to younger healthy teenagers as in many other Western countries.

The World Health Organization is calling for a moratorium on COVID-19 vaccine boosters until at least the end of September, its head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday.

Japan supplied over 6.16 lakh shots of the AstraZeneca vaccine to Bangladesh yesterday. With this, 16.43 lakh doses of the Covid-19 vaccine arrived from Japan so far.

The government will begin vaccinating around 66,000 Rohingya refugees living in the camps of Cox’s Bazar from August 10.

Covaxin, the Covid-19 vaccine developed by India’s Bharat Biotech, got ethical permission to conduct human trial in Bangladesh.

Japan’s supply of 616,780 more doses of AstraZeneca vaccines has reached the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport today.

Attorney General (AG) AM Amin Uddin has directed all officers and staff members at his office to receive Covid-19 vaccine by August 16, and said that those who will not get vaccinated by the deadline will not get salaries after August 31.

Covaxin, the Covid-19 vaccine made by India's Bharat Biotech, got ethical permission to conduct human trial in Bangladesh.

The national expert committee on Covid-19 vaccination yesterday recommended providing vaccines to expecting and lactating mothers after the High Court on the same day asked the government to finalise its decision in this regard within 72 hours.

The vaccines for Covid-19 give protection against infection of the deadly coronavirus and anyone who is jabbed face less severity in case of breakthrough infection, found two different studies by local organisations.