VACCINE CAMPAIGN ON TARGET

Cayman is continuing with an impressive roll-out of the voluntary national vaccination campaign.

The jurisdiction is well on the way to exhausting the first batch of 9,750 doses of the Pfizer-BionNTech vaccine which arrived here on January 5th from the UK government.

With over 6,000 persons already receiving their first shot, a replenishment shipment of another 9,750 doses due this Thursday January 28th is expected to ensure a smooth continuation of inoculations.

The previous plan to split the first shipment into two doses covering 4,875 persons was changed to one dose per person from the entire consignment with a second shot around 21 days later.

At the same time, health authorities are continuing with an aggressive testing programme currently heading towards 70,000 tests, one of the highest rates in the region.

Cayman is also at the forefront of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in the Caribbean and Americas.

UNITED STATES

Meanwhile, in the United States, the new government of President Joe Biden has revved up the country’s COVID-19 fightback with the vaccination programme as a top priority after the Trump administration failed to reach its target of 20 million by the end of last year.

Up to last Wednesday's inauguration of the Biden administration that was short by 3.5 million with only 16.5 million vaccine doses administered.

According to the US Johns Hopkins University, the country is recording close to 200,000 new COVID-19 cases and around 3,000 deaths daily.

In all over 400,000 people have died from COVID-19 in the US from around 25 million cases and increasing, the highest globally.

Globally, there have been more than 96 million cases of the virus and two million people have died, according to Johns Hopkins University.

UNITED KINGDOM

In the United Kingdom, where the death toll is edging towards a grim 100,000 deaths, the vaccination programme is going much better with close to 5 million people already receiving the jab.

However, the daily death reports cast a continuing dark shadow with the highest numbers since the outbreak of the pandemic now being recorded. In one day alone 1,850 deaths were reported.

The UK has the highest COVID-19 death rate in the world.

The British government has intensified restrictions including travel bans, and everyone entering the country now required to go into quarantine.

Lockdowns have also been extended with numerous events cancelled.

Vaccine production in the UK got a scare this week when a plant where the AstraZeneca-Oxford drug is being manufactured was threatened by heavy flooding in the area. Fortunately, damage was averted.

There were also tense moments in India when a factory manufacturing the same vaccine for India and other low- and middle-income countries was engulfed in flames.

Officials said it was not expected to severely set back production.