Bangladesh is going to take the deliveries of over 10 million more Covid-19 vaccine doses by this month which is expected to give a further boost to its inoculation drive, said Health Minister Zahid Maleque.
"Around 5.4 million doses will arrive this week while another 5.0 million later this month," the minister said while addressing an event arranged by Bangladesh Society of Medicine at a city hotel on Thursday.
He said around 17.5 million people have so far received Covid-19 vaccine shots and millions more have got registered to do so. "We need 260-270 million doses of Covid vaccine. All will get vaccine jabs in phases."
Alleging that the rich countries are doing politics with vaccines, the minister said they are stocking vaccines four to five times more than what they need.
The minister expressed his concern saying that if Covid transmissions cannot be controlled, then the country will face more challenges. "The economy will collapse and unemployment will increase," he warned.
The minister, however, said the Covid positivity rate is slowly declining in the country and called upon all to come forward so that the death rate could come down.
Director General (DG) of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) Prof Abul Bashar Mohammad Khurshid Alam said, "We've done everything to increase hospital capacities but everyone has a limit. Increasing the number of beds in the hospitals will be pointless if the main source of infection is not identified and infection rate not reduced."