True: Thailand will administer different COVID-19 vaccines for the first and second doses.

By: Sunil Kumar
July 20 2021

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Thailand has decided to administer the AstraZeneca vaccine as a booster dose for Sinovac vaccine recipients. Only July 12, 2021, media reports stated that Thailand decided to use the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine as a booster, following the Sinovac vaccine. Thailand's Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul told BBC that many medical professionals contracted the virus after being completely vaccinated by Sinovac. The minister said, "More than 677,000 medical staff were fully vaccinated with Sinovac; 618 were infected between April and July." Reuters reported that a Thai study doubted the Sinovac vaccine's two-dose course's long-term protection. Charnvirakul said that the AstraZeneca vaccine would improve protection from the Delta variant of the coronavirus. AstraZeneca's vaccine would be administered 3-4 weeks after Sinovac. Furthermore, the minister added that instead of two Sinovac doses, consumers would now receive the AstraZeneca vaccine after their first Sinovac jab. The third booster from a different vaccine will be given to health personnel who have already been fully vaccinated with Sinovac. This might be the AstraZeneca vaccine or a Pfizer/BioNTech mRNA vaccine. Reports also stated that there are no studies specific to mixing Sinovac and AstraZeneca vaccines. Still, a growing number of countries are considering mixing and matching vaccines or administering a third booster dose due to concerns that new and more contagious variants of the coronavirus may elude approved vaccines.