PM Roosevelt Skerrit asks India for COVID-19 vaccine

Roseau, Dominica: Prime Minister of Dominica, Dr. Roosevelt Skerrit, wrote a letter to the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi requesting assistance in coronavirus vaccination.

PM Roosevelt Skerrit mentioned that although Oxford-AstraZeneca pledged to distribute half of its doses to the developing nations, it currently stands that small nations like Dominica will not be able to get the vaccination for a long time.

"Dominica's populations in urgent need of enough doses of the Oxford-Astrazeneca vaccination, with great humility and respect that you assist us by donating doses to keep our population of 70,000 safe." added the PM Dr. Skerrit in the letter.

The Dominican Prime Minister mentioned the challenges being faced by the island nation due to the coronavirus pandemic.

"Dominica and India have a long history of cooperation and support; we developed relations mere three years after Dominica's independence in 1978." wrote Dr. Skerrit.

Prime Minister Dr. Roosevelt Skerrit also stated that many people of Indian descent reside in Dominica and running a multitude of businesses in the country.

Furthermore, he stated that India even assisted Dominica in rebuilding after Hurricane Maria with US$ 1 million.

In 2016, India also provided medicine for Dominicans as a part of a scheme.

Furthermore, he also asked other people to support the vaccination drives and avoid any type of conspiracy theories related to the COVID-19 vaccine.

Currently, there are only eight active cases of coronavirus in Dominica, and no virus-related deaths have been recorded. The health authorities in the island nation-state that the country has not recorded any local coronavirus case since November 2020.

As per official statistics provided by the health ministry of Dominica, the country had only 110 confirmed cases of the COVID-19 since the first cases arrived in March 2020.