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One medical staff getting her health checked before getting the vaccine (Photo: VNE)

As reported by VNE, the city’s target in the first mass vaccination is to cover 95 percent of its COVID-19 first responders while ensuring the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine.

On March 24 morning, the first 10 medical staff in District 11 Hospital, including 4 males and 6 females aged 24-42 were given the jab. This is the first district-level hospital in Ho Chi Minh to vaccinate its staff against the novel coronavirus as part of the National Expanded Vaccination Program.

All recipients had had their general health checked prior to injection. Their history of allergy, vaccination, and underlying health issues were also under careful inspection.

“I believe the benefits of AstraZeneca injection outweighs the potential risks”, Ho Quang Thoai, 33, chief nurse at the Emergency Department shared his viewpoints about the recent blood clot incidents that occurred to several AstraZeneca recipients in the world. Thoai and his colleagues were reassured about the safety of the jab, unexpected reactions, and post-vaccination self-monitoring in the afternoon before.

“We were taken blood pressure, heart rates, body temperature within 30-60 mins after getting the vaccine”, Thoai was quoted by VNE. “I only felt tickling after the injection, no other abnormal symptoms are seen until now”.

After 60 mins of further health monitoring, Thoai got back to his work and would follow his health condition himself in the next 7 days.

Thoai is getting the injection (Photo: VNE)

This week, District 11 Hospital is scheduling to administer the vaccine to 30 medical staff in three days, 10 individuals each. 212 people in the prioritized list are expecting to get the jab by April 19.

Those vaccinated will be given a “vaccination certificate” to prove they have received the first dose and be reminded of the second dose in the following 12 weeks.

Prior to the vaccination program, Ho Chi Minh City Center for Disease Control (HCDC) had organized two training courses to make sure everything is well-oiled.

The batch of AstraZeneca using in the National Expanded Vaccination Program is part of the 117,600 imported doses that arrived in Vietnam in late February. AstraZeneca is one of the three COVID-19 vaccines in the world greenlighted for emergency use by the World Health Organization (WHO) and is currently used in over 50 countries.

(Photo: VNE)

In Ho Chi Minh city, a total of 926 individuals have received the first dose. They have vaccinated Covid-19 including Hospital for Tropical Diseases (kicked off its injection program on March 8) and 175 Military Hospital (March 16) are the first two medical facilities in the southern city to inject the vaccine to 64 officers and staffs at the Field Hospital Level 2 and 3 before their joining the mission at the United Nations Peacekeeping in South Sudan.

Over 5,000 Vietnamese front-liners vaccinated against COVID-19 5,248 people have been injected with AstraZeneca vaccine 5 days into the vaccination campaign. All are in stable health, no serious reactions recorded so far.

Vietnam Airlines offers free COVID-19 vaccine transportation Vietnam Airlines has offered to transport domestically free of charge 5 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine (11.5 tonnes) supplied by COVAX Facility.

Vietnam continues vaccination campaign with AstraZeneca vaccine Given there is no blood clots in injected people after five days into the vaccination program, Vietnam continues to give prioritized groups the imported AstraZeneca ...