Covid vaccine shipment with 6.6 million doses reaches Islamabad

ISLAMABAD: Consignments originating from the United States and China carrying a total of 6.6 million Covid vaccines have landed on Sunday in Islamabad on the back of the international COVAX program and a gift from the neighbor government respectively, ARY News reported.

One shipment, reaching Pakistan via a Pakistan International Airlines flight, carries 3 million doses of Sinovac vaccines that is a gift to Pakistan from the Chinese government.

Separately another shipment, via a private airline flight, carries 3.6 million Pfizer doses landing in Pakistan from the global Covax program, the sources privy to the details tell ARY News.

The vaccines will be portioned out to the provinces based on their needs and for this the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) has asked the provinces for their data and requisitions.

So far Pakistan has received 140 million Covid vaccine doses out of which 100 million were bought while 380 million were donated to it.

The break up of the donated is between Covax program that claims 30 million doses while 8 million were given to Pakistan from China as aid.

Pakistan reports 591 new Covid cases, 18 deaths in 24 hours

Pertinent to note that the Covid-19 viral disease has claimed 18 more lives in Pakistan during the last 24 hours today, taking the death toll to 28,377.

According to the NCOC, 591 more people were infected with the virus, lifting the nationwide tally of confirmed cases of the disease to 1,268,536.

A total of 43,522 samples were tested in last 24 hours, out of which 591 turned out to be positive, showing an infection rate of 1.35 per cent.