BELIZE CITY, Tues. Mar. 30, 2021– The country of Belize is scheduled to receive its first batch of the Covid-19 vaccine allocated from the COVAX facility on Wednesday, March 31, 2021. The arrival of these vaccines is yet another hopeful sign for Belize’s Covid-19 response, as we see epidemiological numbers related to the virus at an all-time low.

This first allocation — consisting of between 35,000 and 40,000 doses— is estimated to be around 35% of the total doses scheduled to arrive in the country from COVAX according to Dr. Natalia Beer from the Ministry of Health and Wellness. On Wednesday, the media will join Government officials and partners at the official arrival ceremony of the Covid-19 vaccines.

As previously announced, the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine will be rolled out in Belize. Of note, we have done all our current inoculations using the supply of AstraZeneca vaccine that was previously received.

With the scheduled arrival of these additional vaccines, the inoculation program initiated by the Ministry of Health and Wellness will continue uninterrupted.

Key public officials are calling on persons who are eligible to take the Covid-19 vaccine to reach out to official vaccination sites and receive their first jab. At this time, the country has moved to phase two of the vaccination program, and teachers and police officers are called to receive their vaccinations.

As of March 30, 2021, since the start of the pandemic in Belize, a total of 12,452 persons have been infected with the SARS-COV-2 virus. Of that number 12,088 persons have recovered —a percentage of 97.1. To date, our case fatality rate stands at 2.55%, with 317 persons succumbing to the illness. At this time, we have 38 active cases within the country.
Data released from the Ministry of Health and Wellness for March 27th to the 30th shows a total of 12 new cases that were discovered in a batch of 1884 tests processed. Seventeen persons were marked as recovered and two new hospitalizations were logged. Fortunately, no additional death was recorded during that time.

On Friday, March 26, a total of 4 new cases were found from a batch of 811 tests processed. Nine recoveries were recorded at that time. No new death was recorded on that day. Records indicated that at that point a total of 20,411 vaccinations had been administered.

Internationally, the World Health Organization has released its final report on the cause of the COVID-19 pandemic. Preliminary findings suggest that the virus was spread to human beings from an animal and not a lab. Some public officials have openly said that they believe that the virus may have escaped from a Wuhan virology lab. WHO recommends more study into the virus’s origins.

Also, Canada has halted the use of the AstraZeneca vaccines in some groups as a precautionary measure while they study rare cases of blood clots after vaccination.

In the US more than 145 million persons have been vaccinated, but according to the CDC, they are concerned about a possible new surge of cases.

Globally, as of March 30, 2021, a total of 127,349,248 confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been identified. Of that number 2,787,593 deaths have been reported to WHO. Worldwide a total of 520,540,106 vaccine doses have been administered.