KATHMANDU: The Ministry of Health has requested for an additional 1.5 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech’s bivalent vaccine with the COVAX facility.

According to the Ministry of Health, it has requested for the bivalent vaccines, which have been approved for emergency use by the Drug Advisory Committee, with the COVAX facility keeping in view the increasing cases of Coronavirus lately.

The bivalent vaccine contains two components that include the original virus strain and Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 sub-variants.

It may be noted that the COVAX facility, which has so far supplied three million doses to Nepal, has promised 9.2 million doses.

The Ministry of Health has already decided to administer the second booster vaccine to vulnerable people such as elderly people above 55 years old, and frontline health workers, among others.