Bhutan starts biggest vaccination drive against COVID-19
27 March, 2021
A large number of Bhutanese travelled to schools and public structures for vaccination on Saturday (Mar 27) due to the Himalayan kingdom launched it has the biggest inoculation get against COVID-19 with the AstraZeneca shots supplied by neighbouring India.
Ninda Dema, a 30-year-old female born in the entire year of the Monkey according to the Buddhist astrology, became the country’s initially to receive the shot at a school-turned vaccination centre in the capital Thimphu, a meeting that was televised live.
Ninda, a bureaucrat, folded the sleeve of her jacket and pressed her palms in traditional gesture of greetings and prayers just as she received the dose from a masked nurse amid lighting of butter lamps and chanting of Buddhist prayers. The nurse was as well born in the same year of the Monkey.
Buddist years are named after 12 animals just like goat, rooster, pig and religious followers assume that people born on the year of the Monkey are inventive and may solve even the most challenging problems rather easily.
“Let this little step of mine today help people prevail through this illness,” Ninda was quoted by the Kuensel newspaper as declaring after being decided on to take the first jab.
Bhutan has been able to slow the pass on of the virus with early screening and monitoring at entry tips, testing and sealing of borders.
Total infections stand at 870 with 1 death from COVID-19 because the pandemic began, according to government data.
In the week-long campaign the majority-Buddhist nation, tucked between China and India, hopes to inoculate more than half a million people who've registered to be vaccinated.
A country of about 800,000 persons Bhutan received 150,000 doses of the vaccine created by the Serum Institute of India in January. But unlike neighbouring Nepal that has suspended the plan due to the insufficient vaccines, authorities in Bhutan waited for 400,000 more shots that were supplied this month to get started the campaign at once.
The scenic country, which is heavily dependent on high-end tourists, is well-known for its “gross national happiness” index instead of gross domestic product to point real monetary progress or development.
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