RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Bolivian Ministry of Health reported 2 deaths, raising the total number to 18,514 since March 2020, while the total number of cases nationwide rose to 493,115 with the new infections reported yesterday.
The regions with the highest number of new cases were Santa Cruz, with 108, Cochabamba, with 72, and Tarija with 69, while cases ranged from 2 to 43 in the other Bolivian departments, according to the report.
A further 1,664 people suspected of being infected were also reported and are being monitored through a toll-free telephone line set up by the government to attend to requests related to Covid-19.
There are currently 33,399 active cases, while the national total of recovered patients stands at 441,202, according to the same source.
To date, 2,870,996 people have completed their Covid-19 vaccination schedule in Bolivia and another 3,282,322 have been administered the first dose, according to the Ministry of Health.
Since late January, the country has been implementing a vaccination plan that began with front-line health personnel and has been progressively extended since the second week of July to include people over 18 years of age and pregnant women.
The program uses the Chinese Sinopharm and Russian Sputnik V vaccines purchased by the national government, in addition to others donated through the United Nations Covax mechanism, including the Oxford-AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Janssen vaccines.
The day was marked by the delivery of 3.3 million Sinopharm vaccines as part of a purchase of 6 million doses announced by the Luis Arce government in late June and which has been progressively delivered in several shipments since July.
The vaccines landed at Jorge Wilstermann airport in the central region of Cochabamba and were received by the Vice-Minister of Foreign Trade Benjamín Blanco, who pointed out that this is the largest batch of vaccines the country has received so far.
With the arrival of these vaccines, Bolivia has received over 12.2 million doses out of the 18 million purchased by the national Executive, according to health authorities.