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More Moderna jabs to be released for frontline medical workers

ROC Central News Agency

08/10/2021 08:10 PM

Taipei, Aug. 10 (CNA) Another 44,000 doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine will be allocated to Taiwan's mix-and-match vaccine program, allowing more frontline medical workers who have received an AstraZeneca jab to get the two doses required to be fully inoculated, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said Tuesday.

The decision will allow up to 77,000 medical staffers working at designated hospitals that treat COVID-19 patients or test members of the public to receive a Moderna vaccine shot within a month, Health and Welfare Minister Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) said at a press briefing.

The Moderna vaccine doses will be delivered to the hospitals after they report back how many of their staff choose to take the shot, said Chen, who also heads the CECC.

The plan to administer an mRNA vaccine to people who received an AstraZeneca shot at least 10 weeks earlier was approved by Taiwan's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices at the end of July, and the practice began Monday targeting an estimated 33,000 medical workers.

The mix-and-max vaccine approach is being reserved for those who are at a higher risk of COVID-19 and whether it will be applied to other medical workers depends on the country's vaccine supply, Chen said.

Meanwhile, the CECC will ensure people who received their first Moderna shot will get a second jab from the same brand, even though it does not have a schedule as to when the next shipment of Moderna vaccine will arrive in Taiwan, according to Chen.

Note: Taiwan's vaccine rollout began on March 22, first with doses from AstraZeneca, then with Moderna doses starting on June 9. More AstraZeneca doses have been administered than have been officially received because medical workers can sometimes get more than the standard 10 shots from a vial.

Taiwan has to date taken delivery of about 3.75 million doses of the Moderna vaccine, 3.06 million of which have been administered, leaving only 690,000 doses in stock, CECC data showed.

As of Tuesday, more than 90 percent of the Moderna vaccine given has been for first doses, the data showed.

At the same time, nearly 4 million people who have registered on the government's online system have indicated that they will accept only the Moderna vaccine, the CECC said Tuesday.

(By Chen Chieh-ling, Chang Ming-hsuan and Teng Pei-ju)

Enditem/AW