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Over $ 123 m spent on vaccines by SL

20 Aug 2021

Image caption - President Gotabaya Rajapaksa accepting a batch of 600,000 doses of Sinopharm vaccines donated by the Chinese Government at the Bandaranaike International Airport in late March
  • Over 19.5 m doses secured so far
BY Buddhika Samaraweera The Government of Sri Lanka has secured over 19.5 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines and has spent over $ 123.7 million on procuring them, with over 13.1 million of these being purchased while the remainder was received as donations. These vaccines include the Chinese Sinopharm, which is by far the most available vaccine in Sri Lanka, the German-US Pfizer-BioNTech, the Oxford-AstraZeneca, the Russian Sputnik V, and the US-made Moderna Covid-19 vaccines. A total of 14.7 million of the Chinese-made Sinopharm vaccine have been procured by the Government at an average cost of $ 7.89 per dose, if the donations are counted along with the purchased doses. Out of these, a total of 2.7 million doses have been received free of charge while eight million doses have been paid $ 7 per dose and another four million doses at $ 15 per dose. The total cost of the eight million Sinopharm vaccines purchased at $ 7 per dose, is $ 56 million while the total cost of the four million doses of the Sinopharm vaccine purchased at $ 15, is $ 60 million. Accordingly, the Government has paid $ 116 million for the Sinopharm vaccines that were purchased. In addition, a total of 2,719,840 Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines have been procured by Sri Lanka, including 2,219,840 free doses. Another 500,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine have been purchased by the Government at a price of $ 5.25 per dose. A sum of $ 2,625,000 has been spent on 500,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccines purchased by the Government. The number of Sputnik V vaccines procured by Sri Lanka is 195,000 and the average cost per dose of Sputnik V is $ 9.95. The cost of 195,000 doses of the Sputnik V vaccine is $ 1,940,250. Additionally, a total of 464,490 Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines have been procured by the country, of which one dose has cost $ 6.75. The Government has spent a sum of $ 3,135,307.5 on the 464,490 Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines that were purchased at $ 6.75 per dose. The number of doses of the Moderna vaccine received is 1.5 million and they were received free of charge. According to the data available at the Epidemiology Unit, Sri Lanka has administered a total of 17,143,378 doses of Covid-19 vaccines, including 13,689,516 doses of Sinopharm, 2,189,173 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca, 173,598 doses of Sputnik V, 293,050 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech, and 798,041 doses of Moderna. This is a total of 34,286,756 doses administered. Meanwhile, according to the data available in the Our World in Data website, as of 17 August, about 56% of Sri Lanka’s population has been partially vaccinated and more than 20% has been fully vaccinated against Covid-19.


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