The government is also making lists of the health workers and others on the frontline of the fight against COVID-19.
Details of the app and the registration process will be made known at a press conference on Monday afternoon, said ICT Secretary NM Ziaul Alam.
The first batch of the 30 million doses of the vaccine developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca is expected to arrive in Bangladesh on Monday.
Its manufacturer Serum Institute of India will send five million doses a month through Beximco Pharmaceuticals under the deal. The government has purchased the doses from Serum. The Indian government has also sent two million doses as a gift.
The mass inoculation drive will begin in full swing on Feb 8 while Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will kick off the campaign on Jan 27 with a nurse getting the first shot.
As many as 24 others will also get vaccinnated at the Kurmitola General Hospital in Dhaka on that day, followed by a dry run on Jan 28 on 400 to 500 people at five hospitals in the capital.
Those receiving the jabs will be under observation for a week as per the World Health Organization guidelines. The monitoring is required because the trials of the vaccine were not held in Bangladesh.
To register for the vaccine, all must download the Surokkha app on their mobile phone from Google’s Play Store or Apple’s App Store.
The Directorate General of Health Services or DGHS sought the lists of the frontline workers from the government and private agencies in letters to the deputy commissioners of the 64 districts on Jan 13, said Nasima Sultana, additional directorate general at the DGHS.
They will get registered once the app is launched, she said.
ONLINE REGISTRATION
Citizens can also register online on the Surokkha web application www.surokkha.gov.bd, said Secretary Ziaul