The second dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covishield vaccine will be administered from the first week of May, following recommendations made by an advisory committee to the Health Ministry.

According to Chief Epidemiologist Dr. Sudath Samaraweera, committee recommendations included administering the same vaccine to persons who received the first dose of Covishield as part of the immunisation program that commenced on 29 January.

“The second dose will be administered in the same order the first dose was administered,” he said.

Initially, the recommended interval between doses for the vaccine was four weeks but it was later increased to up to 12 weeks for better efficacy. As such, 23 April will mark 12 weeks since 29 January, when vaccine rollout began in Sri Lanka.

While health authorities stated that the second dose would be administered in mid-April, the country is yet to receive more Covishield vaccines from the Serum Institute of India.

As of now, Sri Lanka has received 500,000 doses of the vaccine donated by the Government of India, 500,000 doses purchased from the Serum Institute of India, and 264,000 doses received through the COVAX facility.

According to the Epidemiology Unit, 925,242 persons have been vaccinated in the country to date. The country’s immunisation program was temporarily halted on 11 April.

The country also received 600,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine from the Government of China but only 2,469 of the vaccines have been used thus far. This is because the vaccine is yet to receive approval from the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA) and was used only to vaccinate Chinese nationals in Sri Lanka.

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