The Ugandan authorities are to destroy 5.6 million out-of-date doses of Covid-19 vaccine, worth an estimated 6.7 million euros, according to a report presented to parliament and consulted on Wednesday January 10.
The vaccines had been imported by the East African country as part of a World Bank loan.
“Out of 12,595,920 doses of Covid-19 vaccine in stock, 5,619,120 doses have expired. The value of expired Covid-19 vaccines at the date of the report was 28.159 billion Ugandan shillings”, or around 6.7 million euros, writes Auditor General John Muwanga in his annual report on finances 2023 submitted to parliament on Tuesday.
The managing director of the National Medical Stores (NMS), Moses Kamabare, told media on Wednesday that the authorities would “soon embark on the destruction of expired vaccines”.
“We haven’t received any orders for Covid-19 vaccines recently. If there is no demand from health facilities, we expect more vaccines to expire (…) and unfortunately, this involves large sums of money,” he explained. The report assures us that “funds have been obtained from Gavi (the Vaccine Alliance, a public-private partnership designed to improve access to vaccines in disadvantaged countries) for the recovery of all expired Covid-19 vaccines and their destruction”.
In October, Health Minister Jane Ruth Aceng told parliament that 59% of the eligible population had been fully vaccinated against Covid-19. Uganda has officially recorded 170,775 cases of coronavirus infection and 3,632 deaths since the start of the pandemic in 2020, according to Ministry of Health data.