 St. Lucia, like the rest of the world, is working diligently to access the safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine. We are one of the countries which has signed on to the COVAX facility, which is a global mechanism to source COVID-19 vaccines. This COVAX facility ensures fair and equitable access to the vaccine by all of the participating countries. The facility is making investments across a number of selected promising vaccine options. This will give access to doses of safe and effective vaccines when they receive regulatory approval, and this access will be done by pulling the purchasing power from all of the participating countries. The COVAX facility is guided by the World Health Organization's framework that allows for distributing the vaccine equitably to each country. In an effort to help protect the most at-risk groups in the facilities participating countries. On June 4, 2020, the Global Vaccine Summit, GAVI, launched a COVID-19 vaccines advance market commitment with the goal to ensure rapid but nonetheless equitable access to safe, effective COVID-19 vaccines to all countries, regardless of their income level, developmental status, or population size. In July 2020, the GAVI COVAX AMC was approved as a financing mechanism to accelerate and reserve the COVID-19 vaccine. St. Lucia, along with Dominica Grenada, Haiti, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Guyana, are part of the six AMC caracum countries within our region which will receive a reduction in vaccine costs. It is estimated that the first vaccine supply should be available by March 2020-21. To fulfill the commitment to fair and equitable access, GAVI is presently fundraising to finance the costs of at least one billion COVID-19 vaccine doses, which are fully subsidized donor-funded doses to ensure lower-income countries are not left behind. They seek to cover about 20% of the population of these six countries to make a real impact towards reducing the spread of the pandemic. The Ministry of Health and Wellness has organized the COVID-19 Immunization Committee, which is planning the rollout of the vaccine in country, and this is being done with the support of the Pan-American Health Organization. This plan, which entails a health education and communication module, scheduled to commence in January 2021 ahead of the introduction of the vaccine. This aspect is important to ensure our population has access to accurate scientific information on the new vaccine to facilitate informed decisions in relation to its use for them and their family. Initial information suggests that at least 65-70% of the population would need to be vaccinated to achieve what is termed herd immunity, which is the level of resistance that is required across our population. We intend to monitor closely the use of the vaccine in the developed countries, commencing this month to gain some insight of factors which support its rollout, barriers and any key lessons learned which can be applied to our country. The National COVID-19 Vaccine Plan will also indicate the priority target groups to be focused on when the vaccine is introduced as well as the country policy on the dissemination of the vaccine into the wider community, the policy on availability costs and the conditions for uptake. The Ministry of Health and Wellness will ensure full stakeholder participation as we anticipate a broad level of healthy discussion and contributions for achieving the effective introduction of this new vaccine into country. The Ministry of Health will continue providing updates on this vaccination as we work towards its implementation.