By Maximilian Heath and Anton Zverev
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) – Russia on Thursday delivered the first batch of its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine to Bolivia, along with a larger shipment to neighboring Argentina, as Moscow appears to be playing a key role in the region’s explosion in the region. despite delays in delivery.
A 240,000-dose plane of the vaccine arrived in Argentina, 20,000 of which went to Bolivia, where President Luis Arce was waiting to greet the delivery in La Paz. Bolivia will be the second Latin American country to launch the Russian vaccine.
“From tomorrow, the distribution will start. There are 20,000 vaccines and two doses for each person,” said Pres. Spokeswoman Jorge Richter told reporters. “This is for the sectors that are most exposed and on the front line of contamination.”
Argentina has already delivered two consignments, each with 300,000 shots, although the Russian vaccine has received far less than originally hoped.
The country’s state airline, Aerolineas Argentinas, which flew the consignment, said in a tweet after the doses arrived: “the download has started. The doses will be stored in the Airbus warehouse, packed in Thermobox (coolers).”
An airline spokesman told Reuters earlier that the latest shipment of 220,000 doses for Argentina was split equally between the first and second two-stage vaccine.
The Argentine deliveries do not appear in the five million doses that the health authorities said they expected from Russia in January.
From Buenos Aires, Bolivia’s BOA national airline picked up its share of the cargo to fly to La Paz.
The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), which markets Sputnik V, and the Gamaleya Research Institute, which developed it, said on Wednesday that supplies to Latin America could be delayed by up to three weeks as production capacity increases.
RDIF declined to comment on the latest shipment.
Argentina has not been notified of the size of the latest consignment of 220,000 doses before it was sent, Health Ministry official Carla Vizzotti told state news agency Telam.
“We are very cautious until we are confirmed, due to the particular dynamics of the world’s supply of vaccines,” she said, adding that she hopes more will come “over the next few days and weeks.”
Argentina administered 272,323 people with the first dose of Sputnik V vaccine and 45,710 people with the second dose, according to the ministry figures. The country also approved the vaccine manufactured by AstraZeneca.
There were 1.9 million confirmed COVID-19 cases and approximately 47,500 deaths in Argentina.
Bolivia’s Arce wrote on Twitter that the 20,000 doses its country received were more than originally agreed in January. He said the vaccines would be administered to health workers in the foreground.
Bolivia has had more than 200,000 COVID-19 cases and more than 10,000 deaths.
(Reported by Maximilian Heath, Anton Zverev and Aslinn Laing; Additional reporting by Polina Nikolskaya, Rinat Sagdiev and Polina Ivanova in Moscow and Danny Ramos in La Paz; Edited by Edmund Blair, Marguerita Choy and Peter Cooney)