More Sputnik V 2nd doses arrive in Guyana

Guyana is in receipt of another 5000 doses of the second component Sputnik V vaccines, as announcement by the Health Ministry on Monday.
This batch of Russian-manufactured jabs arrived at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport on an Amerijet aircraft and once distributed to the various sites, persons awaiting their last dose will be able to access the shots.
Due to the rise of variants which affected the supply chain to Guyana, the Health Ministry is only receiving 5000 doses per week. An arrangement is currently activated regionally to ensure that sites receive jabs in time to vaccinate those in waiting.
The State purchase is a sum of 400,000 doses of the Sputnik V vaccine – 200,000 first doses and 200,000 second doses. From that, Guyana has already received the 200,000 first doses as well as 61,000 of the second doses.
The country then placed a second order for 86,000 doses, comprising of 43,000 first doses and 43,000 second doses. However, while all of the first doses from this second order were received, only a fraction of the second doses were delivered. As such, in total, the country is still awaiting more of the second component.
Guyana’s vaccination rates are improving, with 311,539 persons or 60.1 per cent of the adult population taking their first doses. Some 160,649 individuals or 31.3 per cent of the eligible population have returned for their second shot.

Digitalised certificates
The World Health Organisation has said the digital documentation of COVID-19 certificates has been proposed as a mechanism by which a person’s COVID-19-related health data can be digitally documented via an electronic certificate.
“The certificate can be used in the same way as a paper-based vaccination record/card. That is to provide information to healthcare providers about the vaccination status of individuals, providing a basis for health workers to offer a subsequent dose and/or appropriate health services as appropriate. In some instances, vaccination cards are also used to facilitate international travel, for example in the case of yellow fever, where a vaccination certificate may be required by some countries as a condition of entry,” the Organisation said in a statement.
The WHO noted that paper-based vaccination records have presented many challenges – such as the possibility of losing or damaging the card, or even the possibility of fraud. The proposed digital solutions are designed to address these challenges.
“A vaccination certificate can be purely digital and replace the need for a paper card, or it can be a digital representation of the traditional paper-based record. The link between the paper record and the digital record can be established using a barcode, for example, printed on or affixed to the paper vaccination card. A digital certificate should never require individuals to have a smartphone or computer.”
A few days ago, the WHO published a guidance document for countries and implementing partners on the technical requirements for issuing digital certificates for vaccination against COVID-19. The guidance is part of a series of planned documents on digitalisation of COVID-19 certificates. The guidance will, amongst other things, support member states in adopting digital tools for documenting COVID-19 vaccination status for the purposes of effective healthcare, and proof of vaccination should it be needed for other purposes.
The guidance was developed in collaboration with a multi-disciplinary group of experts, to ensure that it will be useful to governments and implementing partners who have built or who are currently developing systems for issuing or verifying digital vaccination certificates.
The technical content of the guidance has been made available to partner countries and economies that have developed, or are in the process of developing, national digital vaccination certificates to ensure that these digital certificate products will be interoperable. (G12)