Bolsonaro pledges enough vaccines for Brazil

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro promised on Thursday that his government is doing what is possible to get the vaccine, after criticism by health officials that the country may not have enough doses of COVID-19 medication to launch a fast, nationwide immunization program. Brazil has available 6 million doses of Coronavac, from the Chinese laboratory Sinovac, with another 4.8 million doses in the pipeline.

Health officials say that is barely enough to vaccinate all frontline personnel in the country, leaving as many as 200 million Brazilians without immunization. In sharp contrast, Bolsonaro pledged that the Federal government is going to provide vaccine to all Brazilians, for free and not mandatory. Brazil has recorded 214,000 deaths related to COVID-19, the second-highest total in the world after the United States, and infections and deaths surging again.