South Sudan will receive another consignment of the AstraZeneca vaccine from the UK-based COVAX facility early next month, the chief of Operations of the Emergency Unit on Covid-19 in Juba has said.

The batch is expected to be a balance of the total 732,000 doses the Covax facility had earlier this year approved for South Sudan to immunize 2.5 million people in the country.

Of the approved doses, South Sudan only received 132,000 in April.

In May 2021, however, the Ministry of Health decided to trade off 72,000 of the doses with Kenya.

This was, it said, to avoid the vaccine getting expired due to its low uptake in the country by then.

But last month, the uptake peaked high with more than 40,000 people vaccinated.

This has left South Sudan with less than 2,000 doses to put to use before their expiry this Sunday.

“When we consume those doses, the next doses will come from Covax in the first week of August. We might have another type with the next request,” Dr. Angelo Goup stated.

The World Health Organization confirmed the plans to bring a new consignment of the jab to South Sudan.

Dr. Argata Guracha, WHO’s emergency coordinator on Covid-19, said:

“We expect vaccines for most African countries to be available by the end of July and the first week of August. By the way for the whole of Africa, we expect 52 million doses.”

According to the ministry, more than 5,000 recipients have so far completed their doses.

This means that more than 50,000 people who are yet to get their second dose will not be covered by the remaining vials.