Minister of Health Khumbize Chiponda has launched phase two of the Covid-19 Vaccination Express Programme to boost vaccine uptake and fight the pandemic.

Speaking at the launch in Lilongwe on Tuesday, she said the country needs to vaccinate a big population to effectively fight Covid-19.

Chiponda said the express programme will help vaccinate more people as well as authorities fight misinformation about vaccines.

Chiponda said: “The whole essence of having this express programme is that we want to make sure absorption of the vaccine is increased because we noted that towards the end of last year we were doing very well, but we reached a point where the numbers dropped.

“Also last year as we were going towards November, we had over 700 00 doses of AstraZeneca, which were going to expire on December 31. That was a big concern [not only] to us as the ministry but also to the Presidential Task Force.”

She said the whole essence of government and partners bringing the vaccine is to ensure Malawians get vaccinated.

“We had targets that by the end of last year at least 15 percent of the eligible Malawians will have received the vaccine,” Chiponda said.

Last year, the country planned to vaccinate 15 percent of the targeted 11 million, but vaccinated only eight percent.

Chiponda stressed that despite the Covid 19 infection rate going down, there is need for more Malawians to be vaccinated, saying come May or June the numbers might start going up.

She said the country has about 500 000 doses of vaccines that need to be consumed by April.

She called on the media, faith leaders, political leaders and other influential people to help reach people with messages of vaccines.

In his remarks, Unicef regional director Mohamed Malick Fall hailed Malawi for the intervention.

He committed Unicef’s support to the initiative, saying the battle against Covid-19 needs collaborative efforts.

“With the strong commitment of the government, including adopting a bold 70 percent population target for vaccination by June 2022, I cannot emphasise enough the importance of collaboration and partnerships, especially at the ground-level,” Fall said.

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