This archive report was first published on 20 May 2021.
Kenya is on the brink of a severe Covid-19 vaccine shortage, with Health Minister Mutahi Kagwe warning that the country will run out of AstraZeneca doses in the next few days.
As of now, Kenya has only about 100,000 AstraZeneca doses left, which is a critical situation, especially considering the country's large population of over 52 million people.
According to Our World in Data, less than 2% of Kenya's population has had their first shot, making the vaccine shortage even more pressing.
The health ministry plans to redistribute the remaining doses to regions where uptake has been slow, with the aim of starting the process of second jabs by the first week of June.
Kenya is also expecting an additional 150,000 doses from neighboring countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo, where there is no capacity to administer doses before they expire in June.
However, the AstraZeneca vaccine is unlikely to remain the 'vaccine of choice for the African continent' due to ongoing delays in shipments caused by the situation in India.
Health Minister Mutahi Kagwe has called for the use of funds originally designed for India to purchase vaccines from Johnson & Johnson or Pfizer, which are being produced locally in Africa.
Kenya has ordered 30 million vaccines from Johnson & Johnson, with the health minister hoping that the majority of the adult population will be vaccinated by next year.
