Daily Times

BEIJING: Over 20 million doses of Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines have so far been transported from China to Pakistan to prevent and control the Covid-19 pandemic in the country.

The Chinese vaccines included 14.5 million doses of Sinovac and 6 million doses of Sinopharm respectively.

A special plane of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) airlifted two million doses of Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine from the Beijing Capital International Airport to Islamabad yesterday, Qadir Bux Sangi, PIA Country Manager for China said on Wednesday.

Around two million more Chinese vaccines will be brought to Pakistan from China within the next few days, he said.

Pakistan has been using mainly Chinese vaccines namely Sinopharm and Sinovac, although others are also available.

The government has run a massive vaccination drive across the country to achieve the target of providing 70 million doses of vaccines aimed at fighting the Covid-19 pandemic.

It may be mentioned that Pakistani health authorities had launched a nationwide vaccination drive with around a million doses of Sinopharm vaccine donated by China, starting with older people and frontline healthcare workers, in March.

The drive began with a focus on the oldest people in the community, generally over the age of 80 and worked its way down.

Initially, the government had to deal with vaccination hesitancy and a shortage of vaccine supplies and had limited shots for people aged 30 or over. Now it is available for people aged over 18 years.

Islamabad received the first COVID-19 vaccine consignment after a military aircraft transported it from Beijing on February 01, this year.