PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) – When Cambodia began vaccinating against COVID-19, lines stretched across entire streets and people left their shoes on to guard the site as they covered themselves from the sun. But three months later, only 11% of the population had received at least one dose. In Japan, a much richer country, it took two more weeks to reach that figure.
Now the two countries have vaccination rates among the best in the world. They are two of the countries in the Asia-Pacific region that began their immunization campaigns slowly but have subsequently overtaken the United States and many European countries.
Among the countries with high rates are rich and poor states, some highly populated and others less. But they all have experience with infectious diseases like SARS and strong vaccination programs, and many have been able to diversify risks by ordering from multiple manufacturers.
Most started vaccinating relatively late due to overconfidence from the low infection rate, initial supply problems, and other factors. But when they did, skyrocketing death toll in the United States, Britain and India helped persuade even skeptics to go immunize.
“It did worry me, but right now we live under the threat of COVID-19. There is no choice but to get vaccinated, ”said Rath Sreymon, who rushed to bring her daughter, 5-year-old Nuth Nyra, once Cambodia opened vaccination to her age group this month.
Cambodia was one of the first countries in the region to start its vaccination campaign, on February 10, two months later than the United States and Great Britain. As elsewhere in the region, the operation started slowly, and by early May, when the delta variant began to spread rapidly, only 11% of its 16 million people had received at least one injection, according to Our World in Data. It is about half of what the United States had achieved in that time and a third of the advance in Great Britain.
Cambodia has now vaccinated 78% of its population, compared to 58% in the United States. She is now offering booster doses and is considering expanding her program to three- and four-year-olds.
From the beginning, there has been a strong demand for the vaccine. The opening of the campaign to the general population in April coincided with a huge spike in infections in India, accompanied by ghoulish images of pyres of bodies in front of crowded crematoriums.
Prime Minister Hun Sen took advantage of his close ties with Beijing to procure nearly 37 million doses from China, some of which were donated. Last week he declared that Cambodia’s “vaccination victory” would not have been possible without them. The country also received large donations from the United States, Japan, Great Britain, and the international COVAX program.
Still, it took time to get sufficient supplies, and many countries in the region that started their campaigns later had even more problems, especially when the region’s main producer, India, suspended vaccine exports during its spring wave. .
“Obviously, getting the supply was very important for countries that have done especially well,” said John Fleming, Asia Pacific health director for the Red Cross. “Then there is the aspect of creating demand, clearly this consists of achieving the interest of the population and reaching marginalized groups.”
Early in the pandemic, many countries in Asia imposed strict quarantine and travel regulations that kept the virus at bay. While vaccines were being distributed at a good pace elsewhere, those numbers sometimes turned against them because they gave some people the impression that getting vaccinated was not urgent.
But when the virulent delta variant began to hit the region, infections rose and more people were encouraged to make an appointment.
Some countries, such as Malaysia, made extra efforts to ensure that the vaccine was offered even to the most difficult-to-reach groups. The government turned to the Red Cross to vaccinate people living in the country without a residence permit and other groups who might have been afraid to go to a government vaccination center.
“We made the vaccine accessible to everyone, no questions asked,” said Professor Sazaly Abu Bakar, director of the Center for Education and Research on Tropical Infectious Diseases.
Like Cambodia and Japan, Malaysia advanced slowly in its first three months, giving its first dose to less than 5% of its 33 million people in that period, according to Our World in Data.
But when cases rose, Malaysia bought more doses and set up hundreds of vaccination centers, including large spaces that could administer up to 10,000 doses a day. The country now has 76% of its population fully vaccinated.
To date, a dozen countries in the Asia-Pacific have vaccinated more than 70% of their population or are about to do so, such as Australia, China, Japan and Bhutan. 92% of people are vaccinated in Singapore.
However, some countries in Asia have continued to have problems. India celebrated in October that it had put one billion doses, but with a population of almost 1.4 billion people, that means that only 29% of people have the full schedule. Indonesia started earlier than most, but has also slowed down, in part due to the challenge of taking its campaign to the thousands of islands that make up its archipelago.
Japan’s vaccination program has been especially slow, scrambling along as the world wondered if it could host the Olympics. It didn’t start until mid-February because it required additional clinical trials on Japanese people before starting, something widely criticized as unnecessary. It also had supply problems at the beginning.
But then he jumped. Then-Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga used military medical personnel to run vaccination centers in Tokyo and Osaka and forced loopholes to allow dentists, paramedics and laboratory technicians to vaccinate alongside doctors and nurses.
The number of doses administered rose to about 1.5 million in July, and the country has now vaccinated around 76% of its population. Much of Japan’s success is due to public response, said Makoto Shimoaraiso, the senior official responsible for Japan’s response to COVID-19.
In Japan, many people are skeptical of vaccines in general. But after seeing how deaths were skyrocketing around the world, that was not a problem.
In fact, Kiyoshi Goto, a retired Japanese man, is already asking for his next dose as he looks apprehensively at the increase in cases in Europe.
“I want to get a booster dose because our antibody levels are going down,” said the 75-year-old man.
In Phnom Penh, Nuth Nyra was happy to receive her first dose, saying that she was afraid of COVID-19 before, but not anymore.
“I felt a bit of pain when they gave me the vaccine,” the girl said at a vaccination center outside the Cambodian capital. “But I didn’t cry.”
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Rising reported from Bangkok. Associated Press journalists Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul, South Korea; Eileen Ng in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.
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