The Private Sector Vaccine Initiative, PSVI, will roll out a pilot operation to vaccinate 1,200 members of the productive sector workforce with the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine, tomorrow, (July 29) in St. Andrew.

Using the protocols designed by the Ministry of Health, the PSVI will act as an agent of the ministry and pre-register staff and named dependents from companies that have participated in the initiative since March of this year.

Fourteen companies from various sectors will participate, including financial services, manufacturing, agro-processing, telecommunications, hospitality and real estate.

PSVI’s Chair of Logistics and Operations Peter Melhado said the pilot will help the entity test out a system which it intends to use in a sustained vaccine programme.

Following the pilot exercise, the PSVI will implement a programme with national reach over the period August to October, during which the entity intends to vaccinate nearly 300,000 private sector employees and dependents.

The national programme will include two “semi-permanent” sites, one in Montego Bay and the other in Kingston, as well roving vaccination sites to be housed at companies with large employee numbers.

The roving sites will be scheduled based on the Health Ministry’s national vaccination plan priority sectors, which include tourism, manufacturing, financial services, transport and agri-business.

In partnership with the media, the PSVI will also launch a marketing campaign to encourage the private sector to utilise this programme, as the pathway to getting more than 65 percent of the targeted workforce vaccinated by the end of October.