More Vaccination Slots Up For Grabs From Monday

The government said on Friday that a few hundred thousand people from priority groups will get their first shots of coronavirus vaccine in the next month or so, as a city-wide inoculation programme gathers steam.

Speaking as five vaccination centres and 18 clinics under the Hospital Authority started giving people jabs produced by mainland drug maker Sinovac, Civil Service Secretary Patrick Nip said a lot of people would like to get vaccinated quickly.

Online bookings opened on Tuesday, with around 70,000 people snapping up all the available slots for the next two weeks.

Nip said bookings would be open again on Monday, with another 200,000 places available.

Three vaccination centres, in Tsueng Kwan O, Kwai Tsing and Tuen Mun that were originally due to provide shots produced by German drugmaker BioNTech will be giving out jabs made by China's Sinovac instead.

The delivery of the BioNTech vaccines has been delayed by two days to February 27.

“We recently decided to add three additional vaccination centres for about two months for Sinovac vaccines because we notice that there’s an overwhelming response and many people would like to get vaccinated early so we respond to this demand and make the arrangement as best as we can,” Nip said.

The government will also distribute Sinovac jabs early next week to more than 1,000 private doctors who will help inoculate people.

Nip said elderly people who have difficulties making online appointments for vaccination centres can contact these private doctors directly to book their shots.