New Zealand has inaugurated its first large vaccination clinic in a bid of scaling up efforts to protect the people from Covid-19 pandemic.
Highlights
The clinic was opened in South Auckland and it will initially target the household members of the border workers. The country has stamped out the community spread of coronavirus. It also considers border workers and their families are most vulnerable to catch the disease from any infectious travelers.
Who will be vaccinated?
As per the Director-General of Health of New Zealand, Ashley Bloomfield, around 150 people will be vaccinated initially per day at the clinic. This number will gradually increase. The health officials have also planned to open two more clinics in Auckland in coming weeks. New Zealand will use the Pfizer vaccine for all inoculations. The country hopes that, it will complete its vaccination programme by the end of 2021.
Pfizer–BioNTech COVID‑19 vaccine
This vaccine is sold under brand name Comirnaty. It is an mRNA based COVID-19 vaccine. German company, BioNTech, initially developed this vaccine later it partnered with the Pfizer to support clinical trials, logistics and manufacturing. The manufacturing license has been given to Fosun in China. The vaccine is composed of nucleoside-modified mRNA which encodes a mutated form of spike protein of SARS-CoV-2. This spike protein is encapsulated in the lipid nanoparticles. It requires two doses with the gap of three weeks. This is the first COVID-19 vaccine that was authorized by the stringent regulatory authority for the emergency use as well as is the first cleared vaccine for its regular use. The vaccine was first authorized by the United Kingdom in December 2020 for the emergency use. Later followed by other countries.