The president of the National Emergency Commission (CNE), Alexander Solís Delgado, and the representatives of the companies Pfizer and BioNTech formally signed a contract to manufacture and supply the vaccine against COVID-19.
This signature represents the legal consolidation of the agreement between the country and the companies, announced on October 1. After the signature on Thursday, the CNE chief commented:
An inter-institutional work is carried out that allows not only to have the first doses of vaccines in the shortest possible time, but also to supply all the logistical requirements that the vaccination strategy implies “
According to the Ministry of Health, with this contract Costa Rica will receive 3 million doses, however, for this vaccine the population is required to receive two doses, so that it would cover 1.5 million people.
In the new contract with Pfizer and BioNTech, the Costa Rican State requested that deliveries of the vaccines be made progressively in 2021, beginning in the first quarter of that year.
Purchases will be made through the National Emergency Fund through the exception allowed by Law 8488.
The President of the Republic, Carlos Alvarado Quesada, added:
Our primary priority and commitment is to protect the health and lives of citizens against the pandemic, so very early we made the decision to negotiate with Pfizer and BioNTech, as well as with other companies and mechanisms, to guarantee us early and timely access to the vaccines, and we are using all the means at our disposal to achieve it “
This contract is in addition to the formal incorporation of Costa Rica to the COVAX mechanism of the World Health Organization (WHO), which also guarantees vaccines against COVID-19 for the equivalent of 20% of the Costa Rican population (about 1,022,247 people).
