Kenya has yet again received a consignment of 504,000 additional doses of the Johnson and Johnson COVID-19 vaccine just two weeks after receiving another consignment of over 252,000 doses to boost the ongoing National accelerated COVID-19 vaccination campaign.
The latest consignment was acquired through the African Vaccine Acquisition Trust (AVAT) mechanism and was received in Kenya by officials from the Ministry of Health at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on Thursday, October 21st.
The Ministry of Health says the consignment will go a long way in supplementing what the Country has so far said the vaccination exercise is going on smoothly. It has urged Kenyans to get vaccinated saying there are enough doses for the adult population.
So far, a total of 4,733,770 vaccines had so far been administered across the country as of October 20th, 2021, Out of these, 3,416,746 were partially vaccinated while those fully vaccinated were 1,317,024.
In a prior briefing, Dr Akhwale said the Government had projected to be receiving one million doses of Johnson and Johnson between August and December and about two million from January. However, he said whereas there are challenges in the global supply chain, the Government was hopeful that Kenya will receive more doses of Johnson and Johnson in the coming weeks.
“We are happy with the increased doses of Johnson and Johnson vaccines as they will be used in our primary health care facilities, as well as our mobile outreach units,” he added.
The vaccines are set to increase the number of those fully vaccinated significantly as they were a single shot dose. The ministry hopes to vaccinate another 1.8 million people by October 20th. He urged Kenyans to turn out to get the jab since there were enough vaccines in the country now.
The Government is working towards vaccinating a targeted adult population of 27,246,033.
