Coronavirus: bookings for Hong Kong’s first Pfizer-BioNTech vaccinations to open on Wednesday, with jabs starting next week
- Priority residents to be the first in the city to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech jabs the following Wednesday
- Some 63,000 jabs are being distributed over the next three days to about 830 private clinics in Hong Kong
Seven more community vaccination centres will open to help administer the jabs to five priority groups, such as frontline workers and those aged 60 and above, in time for next Wednesday’s launch of the BioNTech scheme, according to civil service chief Patrick Nip Tak-kuen. A total of 140,000 slots would be available in the initial roll-out, Nip said on Monday.
The government previously selected 200 priority residents to receive Sinovac jabs ahead of the official start of those vaccinations, and a similar system for frontline medical workers would be in place for the BioNTech doses, the minister added.
“Both vaccines are vetted by experts and their efficacy rates are higher than the threshold specified by the World Health Organization,” said health minister Sophia Chan Siu-chee, as she appealed to the public to get vaccinated as early as possible.
Originally marked to arrive last Thursday, 585,000 doses of the vaccine jointly developed by the German firm BioNTech and American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer only landed in the city on Saturday.
The supply will provide the city’s 2.4 million essential frontline workers and at-risk residents – who have priority in the inoculation drive that launched this week – an alternative to the Sinovac jab.