The International Olympic Committee (OIC) has offered the Indonesian Olympic Committee (KOI) Pitzer COVID-19 vaccine for its athletes competing in the Tokyo Olympiad to be held from July 23 to August 8, 2021.
However, the KOI has not accepted the offer since Indonesian athletes were administered the Sinovac vaccine in February 2021, KOI Secretary-General Ferry Kono noted in Jakarta on Sunday.
"The OIC has offered us (the Pitzer vaccine). They have written a letter to us about their readiness to send the Pitzer vaccine if any of the NOCs (National Olympic Committees) had not vaccinated its athletes," he remarked.
"We have written a letter to BPOM (the Food and Drug Control Agency) to seek information about the mechanism because our athletes have been administered the Sinovac vaccine," he noted.
US pharmaceutical giant Pifzer and its German partner BionTech have reached an agreement with OIC to supply the COVID-19 vaccine to participants of the Tokyo Olympiad.
Pfizer/BioNTech made assurance that its coronavirus vaccine will be made available to any country before their athletes depart for Tokyo.
The agreement between Pfizer/BioNTech and OIC is deemed important since Tokyo and several parts of Japan are currently in a state of emergency for COVID-19 cases.
Over 11 thousand athletes worldwide will compete in the Tokyo Olympiad. However, several athletes have been vaccinated against COVID-19 in their country of origin.
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