Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The government has revised guidelines for AstraZeneca vaccines to facilitate all Pakistani citizens waiting to travel to Saudi Arabia and allowed all those who are 18 or above to get the jab which was earlier restricted to those aged over 40, it emerged on Tuesday.

Special Assistant to Prime Minister (SAPM) on Health Dr Faisal Sultan said that Pakistanis who wish to travel to Saudi Arabia can get the given vaccine subject to showing their documents.

Saudi Arabia had only approved Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines for those who were travelling to the kingdom while Pakistan was mostly using Chinese vaccines.

Earlier, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah also had a meeting with the Ambassador of Saudi Arabia in Pakistan, Nawaf Saeed A Al Malkiy to discuss the matter.

“On the recommendations of an expert committee, we have updated the interim guidelines (for the use of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine AZD1222) today. There are two key changes: Use among less than 40 years will be restricted irrespective of gender (till the availability of further data). 2. Interval between doses fixed 12 weeks instead of range of 8-12 weeks mentioned in an earlier version,” Director General Health Pakistan Dr Rana Muhammad Safdar had told The News.

He had maintained that both above changes will lead to operational ease and added that guidelines should be considered temporary as new data from around the world keeps pouring.

He also urged the World Health Organisation (WHO) to ensure that the vaccines approved by it are universally acceptable.

The WHO has granted emergency use listing of eight vaccines, including two Chinese vaccines.