Bangkok (AP) — Thai health officials said Wednesday that the country would not fully meet its needs and would impose restrictions on the export of locally produced AstraZeneca corona virus vaccines.

The proposal threatens to rapidly increase new cases and deaths, strain hospital facilities and slow the recovery of the country’s devastated economy with the spread of the more contagious delta mutants of the virus. It is issued to be there.

Restricting exports will be a problem for Southeast Asian countries that have contracts to purchase vaccines produced in Thailand, but may be available elsewhere.

Dr. Nakorn Premusri, director of the National Vaccine Research Institute, said the Vaccine Commission had agreed to issue an order to temporarily restrict exports in principle, but did not provide details. The order is issued by designating it as a national security issue.

A company owned by Thai king Siam Bioscience was supposed to supply the country with 10 million AstraZeneva vaccines a month, but earlier this month only 5 to 6 million vaccines. Admitted that it could not be supplied.

Siam BioScience has been licensed by AstraZeneca to be a regional production hub for the eight other countries, despite having no experience in producing vaccines.

Some countries have reported that Siam Biosciences have said they will not receive the contracted vaccine on time and are focusing on speculation that Thai factories are having production problems. Nakhon said Wednesday that AstraZeneca will provide the Thai government with at least one-third of the monthly production at its Thai facility.

Thailand launched a mass vaccination campaign only in early June, with critics accusing Prime Minister Prayut Chan-Ocha’s government of failing to ensure a proper and timely supply of vaccines. Earlier this year, plans were to vaccinate only about half of the 69 million population this year, most of them later this year.

Thailand has been vaccinated 13.23 million times so far. About 9.88 million people, or about 14.3% of the 69 million population, receive at least one dose.

The government is currently targeting 100 million doses by the end of the year, which is sufficient to immunize 50 million people, more than 70% of the population.

Thailand has negotiated with other producers to make up for the vaccine shortage. So far, it has only used vaccines from AstraZeneca and China’s Sinovac and Sinopharm, but said the government has agreed to purchase from Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson as well.

Health officials announced on Monday that they would give a booster dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine to health care workers who had been vaccinated twice with the Sinovac vaccine. They made the decision after a nurse who received two doses of Sinovac in May died on Saturday after being infected with COVID-19.

Dr. Thiravat Hemachudha, director of the Thai Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases Health Sciences, said last week that a study he helped found that Sinovac was less effective in combating delta mutants and was more effective with additional doses of AstraZeneca.

Health Minister Anutin Charnviracle said other Thais who took Sinovac only once could get AstraZeneca on the second dose.

A curfew and other new coronavirus restrictions came into effect on Monday in Bangkok and its surrounding states, as well as the four southernmost states of the country most severely affected by the current virus surge.

The surge in cases has led to a significant shortage of beds for COVID-19 patients, allowing authorities to isolate patients at home and in community centers, giving them access to antigen test kits that were previously limited to the medical community became. ..

India also imposed restrictions on vaccine exports when it was hit by a catastrophic coronavirus outbreak earlier this year.