In an official media broadcast on March 4th, 2021, Minister for Health and Social Development Hon. Carvin Malone announced that the Government of the Virgin Islands will be continuing with the vaccine roll-out plan after this week announcing to the dissatisfaction of many residents that the program was being halted due to a delay in the vaccines arriving from the UK.
The re-administering of the vaccines has been made possible after officials out of the UK have officially confirmed that a shipment of an additional 12,000 doses of Astrazeneca vaccines to the BVI will arrive on March 17th.
Additionally, the minister confirmed that partnership for resuming the vaccine roll-out is being done alongside local health care providers through a signing of a Memorandum of Understanding. He said, “The MoU will be executed with qualified private healthcare providers and require them to conduct vaccinations at no administrative or product cost to persons or to the National Health Insurance programme.”
Malone did not name the health care providers that will be engaging in this service.
With the anticipation of the new shipment arriving on March 17th, officials hope to begin vaccinating new persons on March 25th, with 4,474 vaccines having already been administered the vaccine to date.
The pause in the roll out program allows for officials to save the remaining vaccines for the first group of residents who have already taken the first dose of the vaccine.
Minister Malone sought to assure the public by saying: “We have secured enough doses for the entire adult population of the BVI and will continue to work closely with the Chief Medical Officer to ensure BVI has the supply when it needs with the caveat that this will need to be planned in advance.”
Minister Malone further stated that there is no need to further halt the programme stating, “Provisionally, we have a further 12,000 doses penciled in for the 31st of March providing we continue a steady, planned approach. I hope you will agree that there is no need to further pause the vaccination programme and we should continue to encourage people to come forward for that all-important first dose.”
With the recent announcement many residents are still asking, “Why wait three more weeks to resume”?