COVID-19 vaccination in Vietnam
The COVID-19 vaccination in Vietnam is an ongoing immunization campaign against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), in response to the ongoing pandemic in the country. Following the approval of the Oxford–AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine on 30 January 2021, vaccinations commenced on 8 March 2021, and will continue throughout the year with the goal of vaccinating 80% of the population by June 2022.[4] The Sputnik V was later approved for use on 23 March 2021.[5] The Sinopharm BIBP vaccine was approved for emergency use on 4 June 2021,[6] while Pfizer–BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, Moderna COVID-19 vaccine and Janssen COVID-19 vaccine were approved on 12 June 2021,[7] 29 June 2021,[8][9] and 15 July 2021,[10][11] respectively. Vietnam approved Abdala vaccine from Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology on 18 September 2021,[12] and Covaxin from Bharat Biotech on 10 November 2021.[13][14]
Date
March 8, 2021 – present
Immunization against COVID-19
VNVC – the company in charge of importing and storing vaccines in Vietnam, announced that it is ready to deploy staff and facilities that can store up to 170 million doses of vaccines. The facilities include 49 provincial vaccine warehouses, 2 cold-condition warehouses, and 3 deep-freeze warehouses designed for storing vaccines at temperatures ranging from -40 to -86°C. In February 2021, VNVC's service capacity was reported to reach up to 100,000 customers per day, with the capability to scale up to accommodate the distribution of up to 4 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines per month.[166]
According to Deputy Minister of Health Tran Van Thuan, for the majority of the population to be protected, Vietnam needs to diversify its vaccine supply. This diversification includes using locally manufactured vaccines and the maximizing resources from businesses and local government budgets, in addition to the national government's budget, to support the vaccination program. The budget for vaccinating 20% of the population is estimated at 6.739 trillion VND ($293.67 million USD), with more than 90% of this cost covered by the COVAX Facility. The Vietnamese government will contribute 24 billion VND, complemented by municipal and provincial governments and private sources.[167]
On 24 June 2021, the Ministry of Health established a Steering Committee for the nationwide COVID-19 vaccination campaign. The committee consists of five subcommittees:
along with a permanent office for the Steering Committee.[168]
The National Steering Committee for the COVID-19 vaccination campaign is headed by the Minister of Health. The command center of the vaccination campaign is located at the Ministry of Defence, led by a Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the People's Army.[169]
It is expected that the campaign will utilize eight vaccine storage warehouses, with one warehouse in each military district and another at the High Command of Capital Hanoi. Upon arrival at the airport, vaccines will be immediately transferred to the military warehouse, from where they will be transported by military vehicles to 19,000 vaccination points nationwide.[170][171]
Adverse event following immunization[edit]
Of the 69 medical staff at Gia Lai Field Hospital who administered AstraZeneca vaccine on 9 March 2021, eight had mild side effects and one female nurse had severe side effects. Five minutes after injection, this nurse (with a history of bronchial asthma) experienced symptoms of perioral numbness, vomiting, dizziness, chest tightness and difficulty breathing.[220] As of 17 March 2021, in 20,000 people were injected, 4,078 cases had common reactions like muscle pain, headaches, diarrhoea, fever or hives, five with anaphylaxis grade II and one grade III case, all of these case are in stable conditions. The health ministry has asked local health authorities which face serious post-injection reactions to set up a professional council to evaluate the causes.[221][222] There has not been a single case of severe blood clots reported in some European nations.[222]
On 7 May 2021, Vietnam recorded the first death of a person vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine. She was a 35-year-old medical staff in An Giang Province. This female health worker was vaccinated with AstraZeneca vaccine in the morning of 6 May at the vaccination site in Tan Chau Regional General Hospital. Before the injection, she was screened and explained about post-injection reactions.[102][223] After the injection, she had anaphylactic shock reaction. According to the conclusion of the An Giang Department of Health, the cause of death is anaphylaxis on the basis of non-steroidal allergy (anti-inflammatory painkiller).[101]
On 21 June 2021, Vietnam recorded the second death of a person vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine. He was a 26-year-old teacher in Hanoi. He was vaccinated at the medical center in Dong Anh District on 20 June, after having health checkup and being given eligibility for vaccination. He died at 23:15 on 21 June, 39 hours after getting vaccinated against COVID-19. The cause of death is not known. 100 people besides this man who got vaccinated at that center that day were all stable.[224][225]
As of 5 September 2021, there were 825,305 mild adverse event following immunizations (AEFIs) (3.7%) and 51 serious AEFIs (7 fatal).[202]
On 5 November 2021, Hanoi Department of Health gave information about the incident of injecting Pfizer vaccine for 18 children aged 2 to 6 months in Quoc Oai district. After injection, some children have fever, redness, swelling at the injection site and not recorded any cases of anaphylaxis.[226]
On 23 November 2021, there were at least 72 workers, aged 25–30 at a shoe company showing side effects after injecting Vero Cell COVID-19 vaccine, in which 5 people had anaphylactic shock. By 25 November, four workers had died.[227] Thanh Hoa authorities stopped injecting the remaining 43,000 doses of Vero Cell in storage and investigated the cause of this incident.[228]
Public opinion and vaccine effectiveness[edit]
A poll conducted from October to December 2020 found that Vietnam had one of the highest vaccine acceptance rate in the world. 98% of people surveyed responded they would definitely or probably get vaccinated when a COVID-19 vaccine becomes available.[229]
A survey conducted in mid-October 2021 at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City (where severe COVID-19 patients are treated) showed that 45% of the 349 patients had mild symptoms, while the rest had severe symptoms.
When comparing mild and severe symptoms in vaccinated and unvaccinated patients, 74% of the unvaccinated group had severe symptoms. 40% of those in the vaccinated group (who received one or two doses) had severe symptoms. 49% of those who received one dose experienced severe symptoms, while only 12% of those who received the second dose did. There was one case that required invasive mechanical ventilation and five cases that required an oxygen mask in the group that received the second doses. In the group that received only one injection, invasive mechanical ventilation was required in ten cases. In the unvaccinated group, there were 51 cases that required mechanical ventilation and three cases that required ECMO.[230]