The government is in the process of procuring two million doses of Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccines to supplement the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe on Wednesday said there is a serious challenge in the global supply of the AstraZeneca jab after India suspended exports due to its Covid-19 situation.
He added that the high demand for the AstraZeneca vaccine has made it impossible for the COVAX facility to meet demand in Africa.
The delay in delivery of the vaccine has forced the government to outsource from other manufacturers and suppliers.
Kagwe indicated that the African Union (AU) has negotiated with Johnson & Johnson to enable member states to acquire the vaccine at discounted prices.
The two vaccines must pass the World Health Organization (WHO) approval and the country’s stringent rules before being distributed in the country.
The CS added that the government will acquire special storage facilities for the Pfizer vaccine, which requires minus 70 degrees in storage.
Kenya revised its vaccination schedule and now seeks to inoculate 25 million adults against Covid-19 by June 2022.
On Wednesday, the Ministry of Health reported 965 new Covid-19 cases in Kenya, from a sample of 7,311.
With the new cases, the country’s total number of cases recorded since the pandemic began has risen to 153,488.
As of Wednesday, Kenya’s positivity rate — the percentage of positive cases to tests — was 13.2 percent.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, health care providers have administered 1,618,990 Covid-19 tests, according to officials.
According to the Ministry of Health, 213 of the new cases reported Wednesday were among people aged 30 to 39, while 179 were among people aged 60 and older.
191 new cases were also tested in the 40-49 age group and some 151 cases in the 50-59 age group.
The docket said the total number of recoveries had risen to 105,279 after 1,441 patients recovered in the last 24 hours.
1,317 of the new recoveries were from the Home Based Care and Isolation while 124 were from various health centres; health officials classify all cases older than two weeks as recovered
At the same time, 21 deaths have been reported in the last 24 hours; 9 were deaths that occurred on diverse dates within the last month while 12 were late deaths reported after facility record audits.
To date, 2,540 people have died after contracting Covid-19 in the country, according to figures from the Ministry of Health.
