A shipment of AstraZeneca doses donated by Japan to Việt Nam arrived at HCM City’s Tân Sơn Nhất International Airport on Friday morning. Photo Consulate General of Japan in HCM City

HCM CITY — A shipment of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine doses donated by Japan to Việt Nam arrived at HCM City’s Tân Sơn Nhất International Airport on Friday morning.

This is the third batch of COVID-19 vaccines Japan has donated to Việt Nam after the first batch with nearly one million doses arrived in Hà Nội on June 16 and the second batch with nearly 400,000 doses made it to HCM City on July 2.

All the AstraZeneca doses that Japan gave Việt Nam were reportedly produced in Japan.

As AstraZeneca doses produced in Japan have not yet been approved by the World Health Organisation for use under the COVAX programme, the country has turned to bilateral deals to respond to "urgent requests for vaccine supplies”, said Japan's foreign minister Toshimitsu Motegi at a press conference on Tuesday.

Japan has pledged US$1 billion and 30 million doses to the global vaccine sharing scheme COVAX. Its first shipments through the COVAX facility are expected in the middle of this month, with some 11 million doses bound for nations in South Asia and the Pacific islands.

Meanwhile, outside the COVAX programme, Japan plans to send a total of 2.13 million vaccine doses this week to Taiwan, Thailand, the Philippines and Việt Nam.

With the latest vaccine donation from Japan, Việt Nam has received more than 5.5 million doses, including nearly 2.5 million doses under the COVAX Facility programme, more than 400,000 doses purchased with the State budget and vaccine fund through the Viet Nam Vaccine Joint Stock Company (VNVC), about 2.5 million doses donated by other countries and 97,000 doses that Việt Nam bought from Pfizer/BioNTech.

Another two million Moderna doses are expected to arrive in Việt Nam this weekend.

Minister of Health Nguyễn Thanh Long said Việt Nam has been making efforts to access COVID-19 vaccines. 

About 200 negotiations about vaccine trade and donation deals have been made. Suppliers and sources have committed about 105 million COVID-19 vaccines doses to Việt Nam so far, he said. — VNS