NUR-SULTAN, March 17 (Reuters) - Kazakhstan has paused talks
on purchasing the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine due to
reports about its side effects, the Central Asian nation's
healthcare ministry said on Wednesday.
"We are carrying out negotiations with regards to vaccines
that have the least side effects," Asylbek Nurlybekov, deputy
head of the ministry's pharmaceutical and medical control
department, told a briefing.
Kazakhstan, which has already secured supplies and even
arranged local production of Russia-developed Sputnik V vaccine,
is also in talks on buying vaccines produced by Pfizer,
Moderna, Sinovac and Johnson & Johnson, he
added.
Kazakhstan's neighbour Uzbekistan, which received its first
660,000-dose batch of the AstraZeneca vaccine on Wednesday,
provided for free under the COVAX initiative, said it would
press ahead and use it.
Bahodir Yusupaliyev, the head of sanitary and
epidemiological welfare and public health service, told a
briefing that all vaccines had side effects and that Uzbek
citizens would be able to choose between different vaccines.
(Reporting by Tamara Vaal;
Additional reporting by Mukhammadsharif Mamatkulov in Tashkent;
Writing by Olzhas Auyezov,
Editing by Louise Heavens)