The government is likely to lower the age-limit for Covid vaccination to 35 years from 40 years soon for bringing in more people under vaccine coverage.

‘The prime minister has already issued an instruction for lowering the age-limit for vaccination,’ state minister for information and communication technology Zunaid Ahmed Palak said in a press conference held virtually on Monday.

The government has started issuing vaccine certificates with provisions for verification from any foreign country, he said.

A senior government official said that an announcement lowering the age-limit for vaccination would be made soon after completing preparatory works.

 
The government on Monday also launched a provision for completing registration of foreign-bound workers through Surokkha website, controlled by the ICT Department, for facilitating their expedited Covid vaccination irrespective of their age.

As part of a two-step registration for vaccination, foreign-bound workers would require registering first using their passports with the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training through either www.amiprobashi.com website or visiting any of the nearest BMET offices across the country.

After that, they should complete registration using their passport details through www.surokkha.gov.bd website for vaccination.

Imran said that workers might prefer the web-based registration through www.amiprobashi.com instead of visiting the BMET and other offices for avoiding crowd and risks of exposure to Covid-19.

Potential foreign-bound workers would get text messages on a priority basis asking them to go to vaccination centres subject to submission of correct information, including passport number and name in proper spelling and date of birth according to the passport, in both stages of the registration.

Saudi Arabia and Kuwait-bound workers would get Pfizer vaccine in seven vaccination centres in Dhaka city while other foreign-bound workers would get vaccines in centres of their choice across the country.

The government requested all vaccine recipients, including workers, for going to centres only after getting text messages with mentions of a specific date for the purpose.

About 20,000 foreign-bound workers completed their registration using the BMET process in the past two days, officials said. 

The Pfizer vaccine would be administered in Dhaka city only while the Moderna vaccine is likely to be administered in all city corporation areas depending on the availability of cold-chain facilities for safe preservation of the vaccine, Directorate General of Health Services director general Abul Bashar Mohammad Khurshid Alam said.

The seven vaccination centres in Dhaka city would be able to administer vaccine to 1,400 workers in a day, he said, adding that the vaccine recipients would require taking the second dose at least 28 days after receiving the first dose.

Expatriate welfare secretary Ahmed Munirus Saleheen, ICT secretary NM Zeaul Alam, immigration and passport department director general Major General Mohammad Ayub Chowdhury, BMET director general Md Shahidul  Alam and National Telecommunication Monitoring Centre director general Ziaul Ahsan spoke at the press briefing.  

In an effort to diversify the sources of vaccine procurement, the Bangladesh government has so far approved seven vaccines — Indian Covishield, also known as Oxford-AstraZeneca, Moderna of the US, Sinopharm and Coronavac/ Sinovac of China, Sputnik V of Russia and Comirnaty of Pfizer of the US and Janssen of Belgium.

The government would start delivering 25 lakh doses of Moderna and 20 lakh doses Sinopharm vaccines, received from the US and China respectively, for inoculation across the country after completing preparatory works, said DGHS officials.

The government has a stock of over 56 lakh doses of Moderna, Sinopharm, Pfizer, Janssen and Covishield vaccines.

The government resumed administering the first dose of Covid vaccine with Pfizer and Sinopharm vaccines among the people who completed their registration earlier, officials said. 

Administering the first dose of Covid vaccine was stopped on April 26 amid a shortage of the Covishield vaccine procured from Serum Institute of India.