A resident of Huổi Luông Commune, Phong Thổ District, gets the COVID-19 vaccine jab on Monday. — VNA/VNS Photo Nguyễn Oanh

LAI CHÂU — The northern province of Lai Châu has started to give Sinopharm’s Vero Cell COVID-19 vaccine shots to residents in border communes in Phong Thổ District.

The doses are from a batch of 500,000 doses provided by the Chinese Government, which will be given to three groups of people: Chinese people working and staying in Việt Nam, Vietnamese people who are going to China for study or trade purposes, and people who are at a high risk of contracting COVID-19. 

Notably, to date, China has only allowed people to cross the border who have been inoculated with its domestically developed COVID-19.

Seven vaccination facilities have been erected including one at a provincial level and six in health care stations in the border communes of Sì Lở Pầu, Pa Vây Sử, Vàng Mai Chải, Mù Sang, Ma Ly Pho, và Huổi Luông.

Residents in 22 villages will receive the first shot from July 19-24, while the second shot will be administered from August 9-14. A total of 2,500 vaccine doses are scheduled to be delivered.

In the first phase, 500 locals in the border villages of the commune will receive the first vaccine shot.

Lò Văn Tiệp, head of the health care station in Huổi Luông commune, said all safety procedures have been strictly implemented throughout the vaccination process.

Along with frontline forces, Lai Châu has expanded vaccinations to larger groups. So far, the province has finished two phases of COVID-19 vaccination with nearly 20,000 doses administered.

On July 14, Móng Cái City, in the northern province of Quảng Ninh, began a vaccination drive for residents of border localities, also using China’s COVID-19 vaccine.

The drive, which is projected to vaccinate about 28,000 people in eight border communes and wards of Móng Cái, is set to be completed by July 20.

This is the fifth and the largest immunisation campaign in the city so far.

COVID-19 vaccination is an important and necessary solution to create a safe environment and to serve local economic development, especially the border economy, said Vice Chairwoman of the city People’s Committee Nguyễn Thu Hương.

People who have received the first jab this time are scheduled to get the second one between August 1 and 11. — VNS