Bangladesh begins COVID vaccination drive for Rohingya refugees

Officials say more than 65,000 of the nearly 900,000 refugees will be vaccinated in the first round of the campaign.

The government of Bangladesh and aid agencies have started vaccinating Rohingya refugees against coronavirus as a surge in cases raises health concerns in the sprawling, cramped camps where more than one million people who fled Myanmar are sheltering. The highly transmissible Delta variant is driving an infection surge across Bangladesh, with about 20,000 infections and 200 deaths recorded so far in Cox’s Bazar district, the southern region bordering Myanmar where the 34 refugee camps are located. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies  said a national positivity rate of about 30 percent indicates the spread of COVID-19 is much higher, especially given the sheer number of people living in these camps.