The UK Astra Zeneca-oxford vaccine candidate is presently seen as the best for Sri Lanka against COVID-19, Health Ministry said.
“When we decide on any vaccine, we have to think of its manufacturing level and supply arrangements. The WHO has agreed to provide 20 percent of the vaccine requirement. We have to see what would be the one that the WHO will pick,” Director General of Health Services Dr. Asela Gunawardane told Daily Mirror Newspaper.
Dr. Gunawardane said Sri Lanka was in touch now with different stakeholders on the availability of an effective vaccine against COVID-19.
Meanwhile according to Ceylon Today Newspaper, Senior Presidential adviser Lalith Weerathunga has said that Indian High Commissioner in Sri Lanka, Gopal Baglay, has expressed confidence that a sizeable stock of the AstraZeneca vaccine developed by the Oxford University in the UK could be granted to Sri Lanka, when it starts production in India.
Indian High Commissioner has revealed that five pharmaceutical companies in India have undertaken the task of mass producing the vaccine, given the high efficacy levels shown by the AstraZeneca vaccine during clinical trials. Weeratunga also said he is in the process of studying the vaccines developed by other countries and companies.
The National Research Council of Sri Lanka (NRC) last week said that they have approved four vaccines that could curtail the spread of COVID-19.
The Council’s Chairman Professor Hemantha Dodampahala said that four vaccines are suitable to be used in Sri Lanka.
The AstraZeneca vaccine by the Oxford University, Moderna, Pfizer- Biontech, and Sputnik V by Gamaleya vaccines have been approved by the National Research Council of Sri Lanka, he added. (NewsWire)