Trinidad and To­ba­go has re­ceived an ad­di­tion­al 151,200 dos­es of the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) ap­proved Janssen (John­son & John­son) COVID-19 vac­cine.

The vac­cines land­ed at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port in Trinidad around 6.32 pm yes­ter­day.

The Min­istry of Health said that this batch of vac­cines was pro­cured by the gov­ern­ment from the African Med­ical Sup­plies Plat­form (AM­SP).

The Unit­ed Na­tions Chil­dren’s Fund (UNICEF) is the co­or­di­nat­ing body for the pro­cure­ment of COVID-19 vac­cines via the AM­SP.

These vac­cines will be ab­sorbed in­to the sup­ply of COVID-19 vac­cines, which are used for the na­tion­al vac­ci­na­tion pro­gramme, the Min­istry said.

“The Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go re­mains com­mit­ted to safe­guard­ing the health of the pop­u­la­tion and to pro­vid­ing an am­ple sup­ply of safe and ef­fec­tive WHO-ap­proved COVID-19 vac­cines for the pop­u­la­tion,” the Min­istry said in the state­ment.

It added, “The pop­u­la­tion is en­cour­aged to take ad­van­tage of the wide range of safe and ef­fec­tive vac­cines, which are eas­i­ly ac­ces­si­ble through­out Trinidad and To­ba­go, to pro­tect them­selves and their fam­i­lies from the COVID-19 virus.”