Vaccine doses to increase ‘tenfold’ next month: Iraqi health ministry

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The number of vaccine doses in Iraq is to increase ‘tenfold’ next month as demand outstrips supply, the Iraqi health ministry announced on Sunday.

"In the beginning, there was reluctance among the citizens to take the vaccine, but after a large number of them received the vaccine, others were encouraged. That’s when the turnout at vaccination centers began to increase," public health director Riyad Abdulamir al-Halfi told Iraqi state media on Sunday.

Halfi said the current number of doses is insufficient but will increase “tenfold” next month, with five million doses of the Pfizer vaccine to arrive by the end of September. 

Under the COVAX scheme, which aims to provide equitable access to vaccines for low-income countries, Iraq is to receive 16 million doses by the end of the year, of which only 840,000 have already arrived, Halfi said.

According to the latest data from the ministry, more than 640,000 people have been vaccinated in Iraq, including in the Kurdistan Region.

The increased turnout for vaccines comes as Iraq and the Kurdistan Region have renewed calls for the public to get vaccinated. In April, a member of Iraqi parliament’s health committee said there are plenty of vaccines available but the turnout is “weak.”

The ministry has called for a travel ban for people who haven’t received the vaccine, shutting down public spaces if employees have not been inoculated.

Iraq’s vaccination campaign began in early March with the Chinese-made Sinopharm vaccine.

Thirteen percent of Iraq’s vaccines have been sent to the Kurdistan Region, a Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) health ministry official told Rudaw in April, but the region hasn’t been exempt from skepticism.