Hong Kong could in the near future throw millions of unused COVID-19 vaccine doses
25 May, 2021
Hong Kong may soon need to throw away an incredible number of COVID-19 vaccine doses because they're approaching their expiry time and not enough people have signed up for the jabs, the official warned on Tuesday (May 25).
Hong Kong is among the few places on the globe fortunate enough to possess secured plenty of doses to innoculate its whole population of 7.5 million people.
But swirling distrust of the federal government as it stamps out dissent - combined with online misinformation and too little urgency in the comparatively virus-free city - has resulted in entrenched vaccine hesitancy and a dismal inoculation get.
On Tuesday an associate of the government's vaccine process force warned that Hong Kong residents "only have a three-month window" prior to the city's primary batch of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines walk out date.
"The vaccines all possess expiry dates," Thomas Tsang, a ex - controller of the Center for Health Safety, told RTHK radio.
"They cannot be used after the expiry date and the community vaccination centres for BioNTech will, according to present ideas, cease operating after September."
Tsang said it was "just not right" that Hong Kong was sitting down on an unused pile of doses while the remaining world "is scrambling for vaccines".
And he warned innovative doses were unlikely to be delivered.
"What we have is probably all we've for all of those other year," he said.
Hong Kong bought 7.5 million doses each one of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and China's Sinovac vaccine.
The latter has yet to be approved by the World Well being Organization but was fast-tracked for use by city health and wellbeing regulators.
In addition, it pre-ordered 7.5 million doses of AstraZeneca jabs but scrapped that offer earlier in the entire year with authorities declaring they planned to utilize the money for second-generation vaccines next year.
MEDICAL WORKER RESISTANCE
So far, just 19 % of the populace has received one medication dosage of sometimes vaccine while 14 per cent have obtained two doses.
Hesitancy is general even among the city's medical workers. Previously this month, the city's Medical center Authority revealed that simply a third of its personnel had taken the possibility to be vaccinated.
There are currently an incredible number of unused Pfizer-BioNTech shots, which should be kept at ultra-low temperatures and also have a six-month shelf life.
A total of 3,263,000 dosages of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine have been shipped to Hong Kong so far, but only one 1,231,600 have been administered.
Hong Kong's vaccine hesitancy comes as much nearby countries are scrambling to secure enough doses as the coronavirus wreaks havoc.
In recent weeks, most Hong Kong politicians have suggested that the city could look to send unused vaccines overseas if take-up does not improve.
Public rely upon the Hong Kong government has been at a historical low since Beijing and local authorities cracked down in dissent to get rid of huge and frequently violent protests that broke out in 2019.
Officials also have struggled to come up with incentives to motivate vaccination in a town where long quarantine procedures and economically painful public distancing rules experience kept infections low.
Instead officials have mainly put the onus about businesses to push employees into vaccinating.
Earlier this yr the federal government announced HK$5,000 (US$640) spending vouchers for all residents in an effort to boost the economy.
Some critics suggested the federal government should either link those vouchers to vaccination certificates - or provide further income handouts for the inoculated.
However, on Tuesday metropolis head Carrie Lam rejected that suggestion.
"To offer cash or something physical to inspire vaccination must not be done by the government and could even cause the contrary effect," she said.
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