News Desk
STOCKHOLM: Sweden has discarded nearly 8.5 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine, local media reported on Sunday.
The discarded doses amount to about 20 percent of vaccines procured by Sweden, according to the country’s Public Health Agency’s statistics, Radio Sweden reported.
Richard Bergstrom, former national vaccine coordinator of the country, told Radio Sweden that the discarded doses were worth 1.5 billion Swedish kronor ($143 million).
The main reason for discarding them was because individuals had not had their booster doses as expected, Bergstrom explained.
“The bulk is doses that people chose not to take, in other words, the third, fourth, or fifth (booster) dose. These had been already purchased and now have to be destroyed,” said Bergstrom.
88.2% of adults in Sweden vaccinated at least once: official data
As of Thursday, 88.2 percent of all individuals aged 18 or over in the country had received at least one dose, while 86.4 percent had received two or more, as per the statistics of the Swedish Public Health Agency.
The mass disposal of vaccines by Sweden depicts the global disparities in vaccine distribution among rich and poor countries.
The World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in 2021 that countries with the highest vaccine coverage continued to stockpile more vaccines while low-income countries continued waiting for the shots.
