Bangkok – Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha confirmed the first lot of COVID-19 vaccine was reserved for health and disease control workers.
The prime minister said via his podcast program on Government House’s social media that all Thai people would receive free COVID-19 vaccination except people younger than 18 years old and pregnant women who did not need vaccination.
According to Gen. Prayut, initial vaccination will be for 19 million people including 1.7 million medical workers, 6.1 million people with chronic diseases, 11 million people aged 60 and over and 15,000 disease control workers who are in contact with infected people.
The prime minister guaranteed that the government prioritized public safety in the vaccination.
The first lot of 50,000 vaccine doses will arrive in the near future and will be for health personnel, police, military personnel and immigration officials in risk areas. Their vaccination will start on Feb 14. Then in May, vaccination will cover other risk groups of people.
Thailand would be a COVID-19 production base, so there would be enough vaccine for Thai people, Gen Prayut said.
The government was speeding up vaccine acquisition and people should comply with disease control measures, the prime minister said. He believed that the COVID-19 situation would improve in a few months. (TNA)
