Govt in negotiations to secure vaccines for children

The Guyana Government is actively engaged in negotiations with various organisations in an attempt to source vaccines for children.
“We are in negotiations to see whether or not we will get those vaccines and when we get those vaccines, we want to offer it to the children population,” Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony disclosed on Thursday.
Currently, only the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines gone through clinical trials and have been given emergency authorisation for children between the ages of 12 and 18.

“We have been working with a number of partners to get vaccines that will be appropriate for children,” the health minister added.
As of Wednesday, all of the children who were hospitalised with Covid-19 at the National Infectious Diseases hospital have been discharged.
Health authorities had revealed in January that over 500 children were infected with the virus since the first case was detected in Guyana in March 2019.
To date, three children in Guyana have died as a result of the virus. They are an 11-year-old cancer patient, a 16-year-old and a 17-year-old.
President Dr Irfaan Ali had said whenever the country receives these vaccines, they will go towards children.
The health minister had told the National Assembly in June that the US manufacturers had explained they will be unable to supply these vaccines until 2022.
“We have had discussions with Pfizer to try to acquire vaccines for Guyana. Unfortunately… Pfizer told us that they would not be able to give us vaccines until 2022…We have also had discussions with Moderna to try to source vaccines for Guyana. Similarly, we got a similar answer. And therefore, we would not be able to get Moderna until 2022,” Dr Anthony had revealed.
Guyana is currently administering the Sputnik V, Sinopharm and AstraZeneca vaccines to its population.
A small portion of the Moderna vaccines were also offered following a donation from a US organisation.