As of September 5, Bình Dương Province had administered 1.2 million vaccine doses to residents. VNA/VNS Photo Dương Chí Tưởng

HCM CITY— HCM City and its neighbouring provinces of Đồng Nai and Bình Dương are waiting for the Ministry of Health to allocate further vaccines.

Although HCM City received 54,700 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine on September 19 and 500,000 doses of Vero Cell vaccine on September 18, the city still lacks more than 1.9 million of doses for use in the next 10 days, according to the city Department of Health.  

Nearly 515,000 people need the first shot and 1.78 million people need the second shot by September 30.

Gò Vấp District, for instance, has nearly 142,000 people who need the second shot of AstraZeneca vaccine. 

According to District 8, it temporarily stopped vaccination for locals on September 19 because the vaccines ran out. During the afternoon on that day, it received an additional 3,000 doses of Pfizer and 4,000 doses of AstraZeneca.

The doses are only enough for Monday. It will continue to wait for the next provision from the city Centre for Diseases Control and Prevention (HCDC).   

Vaccinations in District 4 were suspended on Sunday because of a shortage of vaccines. On the same day, it received an additional 2,000 doses of AstraZeneca. However, they were used for only one day.

Dr Trần Văn Khanh, head of Lê Văn Thịnh Hospital, told Tuổi Trẻ (Youth) newspaper, said the hospital was allocated an additional 3,200 doses of Pfizer vaccine in September. This amount was only enough to vaccinate women who have been pregnant for more than 13 weeks and who breastfeed their children.

The hospital is asking for an additional 3,000 doses to give the second vaccine dose to people with underlying medical conditions such as diabetes.    

According to HCDC, more than 90 per cent of people aged 18 and over in the city have received the first shot and more than 20 per cent the second shot.

Like HCM City, the neighbouring provinces of Đồng Nai and Bình Dương are waiting for the Ministry of Health to allocate more vaccines.

According to the Đồng Nai Province Department of Health, the province is waiting for 500,000 doses of Vero Cell vaccine from the Ministry of Health to give to locals without the first shot.

It has only around 24,000 doses left for pregnant women. More than 1.7 million of its are vaccinated, including 98,234 with the second shot.

The Bình Dương Province's Department of Health said it needs an additional 2.7 million of doses for people getting the second shot and those aged 12-18.

As of September 18, the province had received more than 2.2 million doses.

According to the Ministry of Health, more vaccines will be sent to the country by the end of this month. The ministry will allocate these to HCM City and provinces as soon as possible.

In October, more AstraZeneca vaccines and 10 million Pfizer doses are expected to be sent to the country under the ministry’s purchase contracts. — VNS