Bolivian President Arce announces 1.5 million vaccines against Covid-19

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Bolivian president Luis Arce on Monday announced that a new batch of 1.5 million vaccines against Covid-19 will reach the country and upon their arrival, more mass vaccination centers will be set up in the main Bolivian cities.

During breakfast with the press, Arce stated that 500,000 Russian Sputnik V and 1 million Chinese Sinopharm vaccines will reach the country in coming days, which will help to expedite vaccination in the country.

The Bolivian President said that the first batch will be delivered on Tuesday to the central department of Cochabamba and from there the doses will be distributed to the country’s 9 regions.

With the arrival of these vaccines, new mass vaccination centers will be installed in Bolivia’s main cities: La Paz, the seat of government; Cochabamba; and Santa Cruz, the most affected by the pandemic.

The decision to install these mass immunization centers comes after the “success” of the pilot mass vaccination plan implemented by the Ministry of Health in the cities of La Paz and El Alto in coordination with several universities in the country.

According to the Bolivian president, vaccination was accelerated with this pilot plan in which at least 40,000 people per day were immunized.

To this end, new “fixed” vaccination points will be installed in universities and venues where trade shows were held in the 3 cities, and there are also plans to set up mobile points to focus vaccination on specific sectors, such as journalists.

These actions are intended to expedite vaccination in the country and achieve the goal set by Arce’s government to immunize 100% of the country’s vaccine-eligible population, some 7.2 million Bolivians.

The Bolivian government joined an international campaign for the release of vaccine patents and Arce said he was “pleasantly surprised” that U.S. President Joe Biden supported the proposal.

Bolivia has purchased the Sinopharm and Sputnik V vaccines and obtained Pfizer and Oxford-Astrazeneca’s vaccines through the U.N. Covax mechanism.

The country now totals 318,610 cases of Covid-19 and 13,228 deaths since the first case was detected in March last year.

So far, 734,162 people have been vaccinated with the first dose, which began mass immunization in April, starting with people over 60 years of age.