Hundreds of thousands of doses of the BioNTech vaccine are being stored unused in the southern Chinese Special Administrative Region due to the high level of vaccination skepticism among the Hong Kong population.
In an urgent appeal on Tuesday, a member of the state vaccination commission referred to the limited shelf life of the vaccine.
"After the expiration date, they can no longer be used, and the vaccination centers for BioNTech will cease their work according to the previous plan from the end of September," said Thomas Tsang the radio station RTHK.
Friederike Böge
Political correspondent for China, North Korea and Mongolia.
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Citizens who have not yet booked a vaccination appointment for the BioNTech vaccine have only three months to decide, Tsang said. It is "just not fair" that unused cans are piled up in Hong Kong, while other regions around the world are desperately trying to get vaccines against Sars-CoV-2. Some Hong Kong politicians are now calling for vaccines that cannot be bought in Hong Kong to be given to other countries before they end up in the trash. MP Regina Ip called for Hong Kong to donate vaccines to India.
According to a report by the AP news agency, Hong Kong has so far received shipments of 3.3 million BioNTech doses, of which only 1.2 million doses have been administered.
An unknown number of cans were rejected because of suspected packaging damage.
The government's plans envisage that around half of the 6.5 million vaccinable residents will receive BioNTech and the other half will receive the preparation from the Chinese company Sinovac.
Few new infections
Vaccine skepticism is particularly high in Hong Kong because trust in the government is low after the mass protests of 2019 and because of Beijing's increasingly repressive policies. The fear of side effects and conspiracy theories in the social networks have contributed to the hesitant attitude as well as the currently small number of new infections, which makes the immediate danger from the virus appear low.
Around 19 percent of the Hong Kong population have so far taken advantage of vaccination offers. Only just under 14 percent are double vaccinated despite the availability of sufficient vaccines. That is why there are demands to increase the willingness to vaccinate through financial state incentives. Prime Minister Carrie Lam rejected this on Tuesday. "That could have the opposite effect," she said. Instead, Lam appealed to companies to encourage their employees to vaccinate, including with the help of money and gifts. The government is also considering giving government employees extra days off if they get vaccinated.
Hong Kong's interest in the Sinovac preparation, which 45 percent of those vaccinated received, is even less than in BioNTech. This is also due to the fact that the Chinese company has so far barely made its data available to independent researchers. The vaccine has not yet been approved by the WHO.