Sri Lanka has temporarily halted its COVID-19 vaccination programme as there was a delay in securing more AstraZeneca vaccines from the Serum Institute of India, a top health minister has said. Sri Lanka launched its inoculation programme late January when India gifted 500,000 doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca. Till Thursday 913,219 people out of the island nation's 21 million population had been vaccinated. Vaccination programme has been halted from Wednesday night due to the need to use the available Oxford-AstraZeneca doses for the second jab of those already vaccinated, primary health care and COVID-19 prevention minister Dr Sudarshani Fernandopulle was quoted as saying by the Daily Mirror newspaper on Friday.