Ho Chi Minh City needs more than 1.7 million doses of vaccine for the next year.

On July 13, the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Health sent an urgent report to the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee on the city's vaccine needs in the expanded immunization program. According to the review, the city needs more than 1.7 million doses of 12 types of vaccines in 2023 and the first half of 2024.

Of which, the most needed is oral polio vaccine (OPV) in 2023, which needs more than 121,000 doses, in the first 6 months of 2024, which needs more than 126,000 doses; DPT-VGB-HiB vaccine (5-in-1 vaccine) in 2023, which needs more than 110,000 doses, in the first 6 months of 2024, which needs more than 73,000 doses...

The Department of Health said that this report is a proactive step to help the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee send a document to the Ministry of Health to report on vaccine needs in the local Expanded Immunization Program.

Ho Chi Minh City needs more than 17 million doses of vaccine for the expanded vaccination program, image 1 — List of vaccine needs for the expanded immunization program.

Recently, Ho Chi Minh City has run out of some vaccines in the expanded immunization program, and some vaccination facilities are having to make lists of children who have not been vaccinated with the missing vaccines to vaccinate them as soon as supplies are available. This situation is not only happening in Ho Chi Minh City but is also spreading to many provinces and cities across the country.

The problems of vaccine shortages focus on local budget allocation, procurement price consultation and implementation organization... Last June, the Ministry of Health also received many documents from provinces and cities on this issue. At the same time, it requested the Ministry of Health to carry out centralized bidding, ordering or negotiating prices for vaccines in the Expanded Immunization Program.

However, according to the Ministry of Health, for domestically produced vaccines, this agency is currently unable to conduct procurement through national centralized bidding or procurement in special cases according to the Bidding Law. Therefore, the Ministry has proposed the Government to issue a Resolution allowing the implementation of a vaccine procurement mechanism for the expanded immunization program from local budget sources.

Ho Chi Minh City needs more than 17 million doses of vaccine for the expanded vaccination program, image 2 — In recent times, the city has lacked many types of vaccines in the expanded immunization program.

On July 10, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh signed Resolution 98 on allocating the central budget in 2023 to the Ministry of Health to purchase vaccines for the Expanded Immunization Program. According to the Resolution, the central budget will continue to be allocated to the Ministry of Health to purchase vaccines for the Expanded Immunization Program for all localities nationwide. The implementation funding will be taken from the central budget reserve.

The Government assigned the Ministry of Health to guide localities in planning and determining vaccine needs for each type, necessary vaccine structure, list and roadmap for receiving each type of vaccine to ensure a roadmap for increasing the number of vaccines in the Expanded Immunization Program.

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