Health Ministry given VND160 billion in donations to fund vaccine purchase

The Ministry of Health (MoH) has received VND160 billion in donations from various local banks as funding for the purchase of additional novel coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine doses.

This comes following Vietcombank, Viettinbank, BIDV, and Agribank each donating VND25 billion, while HDBank presented VND60 billion.

Furthermore, Vingroup presented four million COVID-19 vaccine doses to the Ministry, with the group also handing over VND20 billion to the MoH to support clinical trials of the COVIVAC vaccine by IVAX.

During the course of the ceremony held on May 21 in Hanoi, Health Minister Nguyen Thanh Long praised the banks and Vingroup for their donation. At present, purchasing additional vaccine doses is one of the leading priorities of the health sector and will ultimately allow people’s lives and other activities to return to normality.

Minister Long also noted that the MoH has negotiated with many countries, organisations, and vaccine producers, resulting in 110 million doses of various vaccines being committed for Vietnam. This includes 38.9 million doses from the COVAX Facility, 30 million from AstraZeneca, and 31 million from Pfizer/BioNTech.

Moreover, it has also registered with COVAX to purchase an additional 10 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines through the cost-share mechanism, he added.

Minister Long went on to affirm that the MoH is in the process of working alongside other suppliers in order to diversify supply sources.