Govt ready to procure Covid-19 vaccine: PM

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Thursday said the government is ready to procure Covid-19 vaccine from the country where it will be developed first.

"Different countries are trying to develop vaccines (of Covid-9). We've heard about it from many countries. But we've approached all the countries (to avail of their vaccines) and allocated money to this end. We'll collect the vaccine from the place where it'll be available first. And we'll use it to immunise people against coronavirus," she said.

The Prime Minister said this while delivering her valedictory speech in the ninth session of the current parliament..

Mentioning that the government has started its drive to collect the vaccine, she said it will be able to procure it from the place where it will be invented first. "We're sincere enough about it."

Sheikh Hasina said the government took preparations to check coronavirus from the beginning of its outbreak in the country and has been able to provide good medical treatment to Covid-19 patients and keep the death rate under control.

The Prime Minister said the government spent huge amount of money in combating Covid-19 considering that the lives of people will have to be saved though many are finding irregularities here.

"Money was spent like water...here many may keep searching corruption here, but it was not my consideration how much money was spent and how much the system loss was. Our consideration was only to save the lives of people. Our thought was how to protect people by taking measures. Since we did so, we've been able to control the situation to a large extent," she said. 

Sheikh Hasina said the government announced different stimulus packages for various sectors to offset the Covid-19 fallout in order to keep the wheels of the economy moving and ease the sufferings of people. "The total amount of 21 stimulus packages is Tk 1.13 trillion, which is 4.03 per cent of GDP."

About the Narayanganj explosion, the Prime Minister said the mosque was constructed on unauthorised land over a gas pipeline in an unplanned way without taking permission from the authorities concerned.

It is very unfortunate that many lives were lost in the incident during their prayers in the mosque constructed without permission, she said praying for the salvation of the departed souls.

The Prime Minister asked people to construct structures following the rules and codes to prevent accidents in the future.

Talking about prorogation of the 9th session of parliament, the Prime Minister said no one from the ruling party got scope to speak up during this session except the day the discussion on the condolence motion was held.

"This parliament was only of the opposition during the session. They went on talking here. During the passage of bills, the House was dominated by the opposition," she said.