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French Health Minister Olivier Veran publicly receives a dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine at a hospital in Melun, on the outskirts of Paris, on Feb. 8. (Yonhap News)

South Korea’s first doses of COVID-19 vaccine will be given to patients and staff at nursing homes and similar facilities on Feb. 26. The AstraZeneca vaccine will be the first administered in the country, with the initial batch of the Pfizer vaccine expected to arrive in late February or early March.

“Shipments of the AstraZeneca vaccine will begin reaching public health centers and other organizations that have agreed to administer the vaccine on Feb. 25, and the first phase of inoculations will begin on Feb. 26,” the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said on Feb. 9.

The first recipients of the COVID-19 vaccine in South Korea will be “residents and staff at nursing homes and other residential facilities for the elderly,” the KDCA said.

First, a review board at South Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety will have to give final approval to the AstraZeneca vaccine during a meeting on Feb. 10. Once the vaccine is approved, distribution of doses for 750,000 people will begin on Feb. 24.

Those doses are being manufactured in Korea by SK Bioscience through a contract with AstraZeneca.

Given questions about the efficacy of the vaccine for people aged 65 and above, the KDCA said it will decide whether to inoculate that age group in consultation with two expert panels, one on COVID-19 and another on vaccination.

The initial shipment of the Pfizer vaccine — carrying enough doses to inoculate 60,000 people — will arrive later than originally planned. South Korea is purchasing the Pfizer vaccine through the COVAX Facility, an international body that arranges joint purchases of COVID-19 vaccines.

Speaking at a meeting on Feb. 9 to assess the status of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments, Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said that the government expects the Pfizer vaccine “to arrive in the country in late February or early March.”

Under the KDCA’s COVID-19 vaccination plan, inoculation of around 776,900 staff and residents at nursing homes and other facilities for the elderly will begin in the first quarter of 2021. Nursing home residents will be inoculated on the premises, while residents at other facilities will be inoculated either at medical facilities or during on-site visits by medical personnel.

Since the AstraZeneca vaccine can be kept at a temperature of 2-8 degrees Celsius, it doesn’t require a separate system of transportation and storage.

By Kim Ji-hoon, staff reporter

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