Health officials in the Eastern Caribbean and Barbados have been forced to dump as many as 62,000 doses of COVID-19, according to Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) figures.
The area’s lowest vaccination rates hover at between one-in-four and a third in four nations – St Vincent and the Grenadines (26 per cent), St Lucia (29 per cent), Montserrat (31 per cent) and Grenada (35 per cent).
Almost two in five Dominicans (39 per cent) have received the COVID jab while rates in Barbados (53 per cent) and St Kitts and Nevis (49 per cent) hover around half of the total population. Nearly six in ten Antiguans (59 per cent) have received the vaccination with the highest rates being recorded in two British dependent territories – Anguilla (64 per cent) and the British Virgin Islands (60 per cent).
The development comes as the World Health Organization has set a new target of a 70 per cent vaccination rate for all countries by June 2022 in order to slow down the spread of COVID-19.
According to Dr Yitades Gebre, PAHO/WHO representative for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean Countries though nations around the world are slowly coming out of the worst periods of the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccination rates still lag behind previous expectations. In the region, vaccination rates had slowed by such a significant amount over the past two months that large quantities of COVID vaccine doses have had to be dumped because of their expiry dates, he said.
Dr Gebre said: “The vaccines are a proven intervention to significantly reduce the threat of the SARS-CoV-2 virus; member states in the Eastern Caribbean have expressed concern of the levels of vaccine hesitancy in their countries.
One thousand two hundred and sixty-six (1266) cases are currently active and seventy-three (73) persons with COVID-19 have died. Five thousand three hundred and ninety-one (5391) cases of COVID-19 and four thousand and fifty-two (4052) recoveries have been recorded in St. Vincent and the Grenadines since March 2020.
There are currently nine (9) patients admitted for COVID-19 at the Argyle Isolation Facility. All are unvaccinated. Seven (7) patients are admitted to the COVID-19 ward at the Milton Cato Memorial Hospital. Six (6) patients are unvaccinated, one (1) patient is fully vaccinated.
Dr Gebre estimates that some $2.8 million will be required between now and 2022, in order for a comprehensive vaccine campaign to be roll-out within Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean.