Bangladesh to float international tenders for COVID-19 vaccines

Bangladesh government would float international tender to buy COVID-19 vaccine, said Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research principal scientific officer ASM Alamgir of on Monday.

He said that they had already approached vaccine manufactures, including US drugs manufacturer Johnson and Johnson and Russian manufacturer of sputnik.

Alamgir made the statements while addressing a webinar organised by the Center for Policy Dialogue.

Though he did not specify of any time, he said that the tender would be floated as per the country’s procurement rules.

He said that they had over 700 cold-chain management units, capable of meeting the maintenance criteria of vaccines so far invented globally.

Alamgir said that they did not have adequate dozes for vaccinating the targeted number people.

He hoped that withdrawal of export ban imposed in March by India would enable them to resume import of the vaccines from the country.

India has reportedly put a temporary hold on all major exports of the Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccines manufactured by the Serum Institute of India.

Bangladesh has a purchase deal with Serum and its local vendor Beximco Pharma to get three crore doses of the vaccine by June.

Serum has provided 70 lakh doses in two shipments in January and February.

News Courtesy:

https://www.newagebd.net/article/135164/bangladesh-to-float-international-tenders-for-covid-19-vaccines