ACCRA, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Ghana plans to procure 17.6 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine by the end of June with the first doses arriving in March, President Nana Akufo-Addo said on Sunday.

Like other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, Ghana is battling a second wave of the novel coronavirus. Its daily infection rate is rising and is close to record levels, data compiled by Reuters shows. So far it has recorded over 63,000 cases and 416 deaths.

“Our aim is to vaccinate the entire population, with an initial target of twenty million people,” Akufo-Addo said in a speech to the West African nation of around 30 million.

He did not say which vaccines they planned to acquire.

As richer nations race ahead with mass immunisation campaigns, Africa is scrambling to obtain supplies for its 1.3 billion people. Only a handful of African nations have begun giving doses.

(Reporting by Christian Akorlie Writing by Alessandra Prentice; editing by Barbara Lewis)

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