Indonesia has received the equivalent of more than 10 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccine in the last four days, including the first-ever arrival of the vaccine developed by China’s Sinopharm.
A Garuda Indonesia plane delivered half-finished vaccine from Sinovac Biotech that according to local officials is equivalent to 6 million doses. The same plane also carried 482,400 Sinopharm doses.
Four days earlier, 3.8 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine arrived at the Soekarno Hatta International Airport, acquired through the global procurement scheme Covax.
“The latest shipment is the tenth batch of vaccine delivery, bringing the total amount of vaccine to the equivalent of 65.5 million doses of Sinovac vaccine and 8,448,000 vials of vaccine from Sinovac, Sinopharm and AstraZeneca,” Information Technology Minister Johnny Plate said in a news conference at the airport.
Sinovac has reached a joint production deal with state-run pharmaceutical company Bio Farma to produce and distribute the vaccine.
The Indonesian company has targeted to produce 122 million doses of vaccine under license from Sinovac until the end of the year.
Earlier in the day, the Drug and Food Supervisory Agency (BPOM) issued approval for the emergency use of Sinopharm vaccine.
Indonesia has administered 12.3 million doses of vaccine since the mass inoculation campaign began on January 13.
More than 7.5 million Indonesian citizens have been fully vaccinated, but the figure remains well below the current target of around 40 million.
By early next year, the government expects that 70 percent of the population, or 181 million, will receive double doses of Covid-19 vaccine.
