By Chantalé Fletcher
MINISTER of Finance Colm Imbert says the Government spent $123.1 million on general revenues for the procurement of vaccines.
Also, medical equipment and other supplies will be purchased through the utilization from the two loans sourced by the government.
During his delivery of the 2021\2022 fiscal budget presentations on Monday, he said, “So far, to ensure the timely acquisition of vaccines, the Government has spent US$18.1 million or TT$123.1 million of our general revenues on vaccines.”
Imbert said, “The two loan facilities originally earmarked for the purchase of vaccines, namely a US$50 million loan from the Latin American Development Bank (CAF) and a US$204 million loan from the China Development Bank (CDB) will now be utilized for other purposes such as the purchase of medical equipment and supplies, pharmaceuticals, PPE and other approved purposes.”
He added that the government provided substantial support to individuals and businesses.
Imbert said, “Public Sector workers remained employed and got paid, whether at work full-time or working remotely, and protected jobs and incomes in the private sector.
“Since March 2020, we have incurred expenditures of over $5 billion through Covid-19 relief for individuals and businesses, including small and medium-sized businesses as well as economy-wide liquidity support with an associated lowering of interest rates by the Central Bank.”
The government acted swiftly and decisively to contain the pandemic through border closures and the implementation of multiple mandatory health and safety measures.
He said parallel health facilities were created to cater for those infected and placed people at the centre of our response to the virus.
Imbert said, “We accessed the COVAX facility, a Covid-19 vaccine Global Access aimed at equitable access to Covid-19 vaccines directed by GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the World Health Organization (WHO).”
The government made an order for 923,340 vaccines from Covax and therefore so far received three shipments of the Oxford/AstraZeneca with 33, 600 doses of Covid-19 vaccine each in March, May and August.
He said there were several bilateral arrangements through which five further shipments of Covid-19 vaccines were received – 200,000 Sinopharm in June 2021; 800,000 Sinopharm in July 2021; and 108,700 of single-dose Johnson & Johnson (J&J) in August 2021.
This was out of a total order of 800,000 J&J vaccines.”
Imbert stated vaccines donations were also received from several countries, among others in 2021.
“Barbados donated 2,000 AstraZeneca in February, India with 40,000 April 2021, 16,000 from St. Vincent, 9,000 from Bermuda, 17,819 from Grenada in May with 17,819 also from Grenada in June, 82,030 from Canada in August.”
He also added that China donated 100,000 Sinopharm in May and the United States donated 305,370 Pfizer vaccine in August 2021; with more vaccines offered by the United States.
Imbert said, “In total over 1.0 million doses of WHO-approved vaccines have been administered so far in Trinidad and Tobago, with 800,000 doses in stock still available for the remainder of the population, with further vaccines on order, if required.”
