The Government chief also suggested Pfizer transfer vaccine and drug production technologies to the Southeast Asian country.

The Government had signed a contract to buy 31 million Pfizer doses. It also decided to purchase an addition of nearly 20 million doses from the company last week.

Pham said he will task the Ministry of Health and diplomatic mission in the U.S. to contact the American vaccine producer’s representatives to discuss cooperation in research and development of COVID-19 treatment drugs.

For his part, Bourla committed to seek ways to step up vaccine delivery to Viet Nam in August, September and the fourth quarter this year.

He welcomed Pham’s proposal, saying the company stands ready to embark on strategic and long-term cooperation with Viet Nam.

Earlier on Thursday, Pham urged Astrazeneca to step up vaccine delivery to Viet Nam during his phone conversation with CEO Pascal Soriot.

Under a contract signed between Viet Nam Vaccine Joint Stock Company (VNVC) and AstraZeneca, the latter will provide 30 million doses to Viet Nam. To date, 5.5 million doses been delivered, accounting for 20 percent of the deal. With these, Viet Nam has received a total of some 19 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from various sources.

Viet Nam is now in desperate need of vaccines for its nationwide vaccination campaign with an aim to achieve herd immunity by the end of this year or early 2022.

To realize the strategy, the Government is making every effort to secure enough vaccines, including deployment of “vaccine diplomacy” activities and fostering research and development of homegrown vaccines.

As of late August 20, 16,306,199 doses of vaccines have been administered in Viet Nam, with 1,636,372 people fully vaccinated./.