Finance and Economic Development Minister Mthuli Ncube has told Parliament that the country has used about US$140 million so far in buying vaccines for COVID-19.
Covid-19 was reported in Zimbabwe in March of 2020 and has affected thousands of people while killing several others.
Vaccines are currently the only available shield against the Covid-19 virus which has mutated several times.
This has seen Zimbabwe joining the people vaccine train since February 2021.
The government has a target of vaccinating about 10 million people which is about 60% to reach herd immunity.
Vaccines from China, Russia, and India have been used in the vaccination program.
Giving an update on the current economic situation in the country, Minister Mthuli Ncube told the National Assembly that more vaccines were on the way.
‘’A few words on Covid-19, Zimbabwe together with the global community has been under attack from the Covid-19 pandemic since 20th March 2020 which posed several challenges retarding the full attainment of the desired economic outcomes.
‘’To mitigate the impact of the disease, the government has spent over US$140 million on the procurement of 22.4 million vaccine doses, and this is enough to vaccinate the bulk of our population, or at least 60% of the population which is herd immunity.
‘’Madam Speaker Ma’am, we have an additional 10 million doses that have been donated to Zimbabwe by the government of China. We have not taken delivery because we still need to exhaust what we have. So, we have enough vaccines to vaccinate everyone, and everyone can also receive a booster shot.
‘’I hope that members of the august House are beginning to receive their booster shots, and I encourage them to do so if they have not. I certainly have,’’ he said.
The finance minister also applauded the support that the country has received from development partners to fight Covid-19.
‘’Government also appreciates the continued support coming from development partners to compliment efforts in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic. To date, the Government has received US$150.5 million from development partners, which has been spent on COVID-19-related expenditures.
‘’Zimbabwe also received US$961 million in the form of SDR allocation, as you know; I presented how this money has been spent in terms of socio-economic, infrastructure, productive sectors as well as supporting our contingency fund for the future, and making sure that we bolster our foreign reserves,’’ he said.
