The Guatemalan Ministry of Health reported that more than a million Sputnik V vaccines have expired.
The Minister of Health, Francisco Coma, assured in a press conference that the doses have expired because there is a refusal of Guatemalans to be vaccinated.
“We have tried to put all the vaccines of the different brands at the service of the population. Unfortunately there is a rejection of the population to vaccination. It is by no means a justification, but it has to be said,” Coma said at a conference at the ministry’s headquarters in Guatemala City.
In total, there were 1,062,412 expired doses, which is equivalent to a loss of 84.2 million quetzals (11.2 million dollars) for the State.
In April 2021, Guatemala paid 614.5 million quetzales (81.9 million dollars) to the Russian Investment Fund for the purchase of eight million doses of Sputnik V vaccines.
At the press conference it was denounced by the health authorities that there are 300 communities that reject the vaccine for their inhabitants. “We have had vaccinators, the work of reaching distant communities has been done, but we have had resistance,” added Minister Coma.
The Sputnik V vaccines that expired are of the first component and in the warehouses of the Ministry of Health there are 1.7 million doses of the second component that expire in March.
“We are going to lose 200 million (quetzales, equivalent to 26.6 million dollars) due to the irresponsibility of the government that did business with the Russian Investment Fund,” opposition deputy Orlando Blanco told the press on a visit he made to the National Biological Center of the Ministry of Health, where the vaccines are stored.
The congressman assured that he will challenge the Minister of Health to report on the expiration of the vaccines.
Guatemala has a population of 12,650,000 people eligible to be vaccinated and of that number 5,660,000 Guatemalans have received both doses (43% of the target audience). In the country there are still no vaccines for children under 11 years of age.
Since March 2020, Guatemala has reported 776,000 cases of COVID-19, of which 16,971 have died.
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