The scene at the El Alto airport, near the capital, La Paz, Bolivia was one of great joy and excitement Jan. 28 as President Luis Arce welcomed the arrival of the first batch of 20,000 doses of the Sputnik V vaccine shipped from Buenos Aires, thanks to the collaboration of Argentine President Alberto Fernández. Accompanied by cabinet members, other government officials, media and friends, Arce greeted the flight of the state airline, Boliviana de Aviación (BoA), boarded the plane to take a first look at the many boxes of vaccine, and personally oversaw their unloading and transport to the storage area where they would be kept briefly. Throughout, he tweeted messages expressing great hope and optimism to the Bolivian people. “We don’t talk. We’re a government that gets results,” he said, even after being in power for only three months. “This is a national government and this is something we do with the greatest sense of responsibility and affection for the Bolivian people.”
Arce only took power in early November, and had to face the economic debacle and coronavirus disaster left behind by the neoliberal government of Jeanine Áñez who illegally seized power a year earlier following the coup that ousted President Evo Morales. President Luis Arce immediately began a program of economic reconstruction and of mass COVID testing while working aggressively to obtain vaccine. As a result, between now and June, another 5.2 million doses of Sputnik V will arrive, 5 million of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine and another 5.1 million doses through the World Health Organization’s COVAX program. Based on a phone call he had with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Jan. 28, Arce will also be negotiating with China to acquire its vaccine.
