Jabs to be launched at schools to overcome low turnout

The government is planning to provide students aged 12 to 17 access to Covid-19 vaccines in every school as part of an expanded inoculation campaign for children.

Health authorities will implement the initiative “very soon”, Health Minister Zahid Maleque said on Thursday.

Mobile teams will be deployed to administer the shots to students in schools while the vaccination centres will also be operating as usual.

Bangladesh opened the immunisation campaign for school-going children at eight centres in Dhaka on Nov 3. But the authorities have been struggling to draw children to the vaccination centres, each set up with the aim of inoculating students from at least five schools in the vicinity.

Referring to the low turnout at the centres, Maleque said, “That is why we have decided to send our teams to schools where we cannot operate a vaccination centre. Our teams will go to the schools and vaccinate (the children) there.”

Students will be administered the US-made Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, according to the minister. But storing the vaccine is a challenge as it needs to be kept at temperatures between -90 degrees Celsius and -60 degrees Celsius.

Asked about the potential storage difficulties, the minister said, “We are vaccinating students in Dhaka as well as in other districts. It is a challenge. We have accepted the challenge. We will take any steps to vaccinate children inside schools."

In a test run on Oct 14, the authorities administered Pfizer doses to 120 students from several schools in Manikganj. None of the recipients showed any negative effects.

Bangladesh has received 15 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, all of which came from the US through the COVAX programme.

The South Asian country has also struck a deal to buy over 70 million doses of the Sinovac vaccine from China. Maleque said the first shipment of the Chinese vaccine could start arrive this month.

"We haven't received a schedule yet. We are hoping to get it at the end of November but it could also arrive next month."