<Anchor> The
government has announced that healthy adults will be able to get the vaccine from July this year.
It is also pushing forward with a contract with NovaVax, a US pharmaceutical company, to secure additional vaccines.
This is Lee Hyun-jung reporter.
<Reporter> The
quarantine authorities said they plan to start vaccinating adults aged 19 to 49 starting in the third quarter so that they can form a population immunity around November this year, before the start of winter.
In addition, we are reviewing ways to partially cover the cost of vaccination, such as the purchase of syringes and hospital vaccination fees, as well as the vaccine purchase cost.
Currently, the corona19 vaccine secured by the government is 56 million people promised from four pharmaceutical companies and COVAX facilities.
The government is negotiating with the US pharmaceutical company NovaVax to secure more vaccines for 10 million people.
NovaVax is currently undergoing phase 3 clinical trials in the United States, and it is expected to end within the first quarter as soon as possible.
The advantage of NovaVax vaccine is that it can be distributed and stored between 2 and 8 degrees Celsius, unlike Pfizer, Moder, or vaccines.
At the end of the contract with NovaVax, you will have at least 66 million people.
[Jeong Eun-kyung/Director of Disease Control (Yesterday): There is such uncertainty about how long the immunity will last, and how much additional vaccinations, re-vaccinations, and how much these parts will be needed, and issues remain in such areas as supply or permission...
.]
The government plans to secure enough vaccines to reduce uncertainty and provide a stable supply.
However, we cannot guarantee that all vaccines will have no side effects or will produce the expected effect.