Thailand’s well-known virologist, Dr. Yong Poovorawan, has stressed the need for the speedy mass vaccination of over 70% of the country’s population, or 50 million people, in order to generate herd immunity, so that the country can return to normality.

In his Facebook post on Friday, Dr. Yong, an virology expert at Chulalongkorn University, said that, to inoculate 50 million people, including children, with two doses each, Thailand would have to procure about 100 million doses of vaccines or, if children are not included, 85 million doses will be needed.

Given the 63 million doses ordered, including the few million already available, he said that more vaccines will have to be procured, to meet the required amount to generate herd immunity.