Jakarta (VNA) - The Food and Drug Supervisory Agency (BPOM) of Indonesia has consideredgranting emergency using licenses for three COVID-19 vaccines namelyAstraZeneca, Sinopharm and Novavax, Head of BPOM Penny K. Lukito said.

Speaking at an online press conference on February 7, Peny said it will take upto 20 working days for the consideration process after BPOM has received allthe necessary data from pharmaceutical companies representing vaccinemanufacturers.

According to Penny, BPOM is still waiting for these companies to complete thesubmission of data.

However, data may beprovided in stages, while the consideration is under process. Sinovac'sCoronavac vaccine is the only one that has received an emergency licence fromBPOM to date.

In January 14, Indonesia officially launched the first phase of its national programmeon free vaccination against COVID-19 among health workers and civil servants,with three million doses of Coronavac vaccine provided by Sinovac.

The Indonesian government's updated data shows that nearly 800,000 people were giventhe first shot.

Another 25 million doses of the vaccine are expected to be produced by the endof March with materials supplied by Sinovac, local officials said.

Previously, the Indonesian government also identified seven COVID-19 vaccinesthat will be considered to be used in the country, including Sinopharm,AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna, Novavax, Sinovac, and the Redand White Indonesian-developed vaccine.

Meanwhile, FreshNews of Cambodia has reported that 600,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine funded byChina were delivered to Cambodia on February 7.

Under the plan,China will provide 1 million doses of COVID19 vaccine to Cambodia. In the firstphase, 300,000 doses will be handed over to the Health Ministry, and theremaining 300,000 doses to the Ministry of Defence.

A number of other Southeast Asian countries are also gradually implementing theCOVID-19 vaccination programme.

Singapore started its vaccination programme at the end of December 2020 and isexpected to have enough vaccines for all residents by September 2021.

Despite reaching anagreement to import 2 million doses of vaccine from China before April 2021 forhealth workers, Thailand has to rely on the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine of theUK that will be produced domestically for its extensive vaccination programme ./.