General News of Tuesday, 3 August 2021
Source: www.ghanaweb.live
2021-08-03Coronavirus: It’s about availability of vaccines not govt’s inability to pay for it – John Kumah
Deputy Minister of Finance, John Kumah
• Ghana began its vaccine rollout in March this year
• President Akufo-Addo was the first recipient of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine
• The Dep. Min. of Finance has stressed that the delay in procuring more vaccines is a result of a global shortage
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President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in March 2021 became the world’s first recipient of the COVID-19 vaccine from COVAX. It was the beginning of vaccine rollout in Ghana as he publicly received a shot of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine.
Ghana has from March administered some 1.271 million doses of coronavirus vaccine to its populace.
Accessing the vaccine has however become a global challenge especially in developing countries, including Ghana.
The Deputy Minister of Finance, John Kumah, speaking at a debate on the Finance Minister’s statement on the mid-year fiscal policy review of 2021 budget and economic policy of the government noted that the delay in procuring more vaccines to help in Ghana’s fight against the virus was as a result of “unavailability of vaccines” and not government’s inability to pay for COVID-19 vaccines as speculated.
He explained that there has been a global shortage.“Every country as we speak today has been struggling to acquire these vaccines so it is not the question of government’s inability to pay for the vaccines.
“Mr Speaker, it more to do with the availability of the vaccines than money and that is why government has failed to achieve herd immunity as previously arranged,” said Mr Kumah in a report by Ghanaian Times.
He added that: “We strongly believe, as arranged in this mid-year budget review that from this month onwards, government would be in a position to acquire at least 17 million vaccines to vaccinate the population.
The president in his last address noted that country is expected to receive an additional 18.4 million vaccines in the third quarter of the year from the governments of the United States of America and the United Kingdom as well as other agencies."
