First workers in Vietnam’s epicenters of Bac Giang and Bac Ninh were given the first shots of Covid-19 vaccine today [May 27] as part of the country’s efforts to stamp out the pandemic that causes more than 2,000 infections there.

Testing before vaccination in Hanoi. Photo: Kinh Te Do Thi

They are the first among around 240,000 workers in foreign-invested companies in the two provinces to get vaccines in the next one to two weeks.

Today, some 100 doses, out of roughly 90,000 doses allocated for workers in the locality, have been administered in the first rollout to workers at Funing Precision Component Co., Ltd of Taiwan-based Foxconn in Bac Ninh province.

On the same day, workers at Phu Hong Co., Ltd in Bac Giang have been injected some 300 doses. Bac Giang will likely get 150,000 doses for workers.

Initially, workers were included in the priority list for Covid-19 vaccination in Vietnam but they have been added to the inoculation drive following the widespread transmission in industrial parks in Bac Giang, which houses Apple’s major assembler Foxconn, and Bac Ninh, the place is located Samsung Electronics Vietnam (SEV) and Canon Vietnam Co., Ltd.

Vietnam has begun its vaccination on March 8. More than 1.16 million doses have been administered to health workers and frontline forces (members of the steering committee for Covid-19 prevention at all levels, people working in quarantine centers, contact tracers, volunteers, reporters, among others); army officers; policemen; and reporters.

Vietnam is facing a thin vaccine supply. The country of 100-million people has received approximately 2.7 million doses so far.