ISLAMABAD: The National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) on Saturday said that at least 5.6 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine will arrive in the country by the end of March.
In a statement, the NCOC said that out of the 5.6 million vaccine doses, 2.8 million from World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Covax initiative will reach the country in the first week of March and 2.8 million additional doses will arrive by the second week of March. The country will receive a total of 17.1 million Covid-19 vaccine doses by the end of June.
In addition to the 500,000 doses of Sinopharm from China, Pakistan has also secured 17 million indicative doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, out of which 35-40 per cent or 6 to 6.8 million doses will be available within the first quarter of the current year.
Giving an overview of the ongoing vaccination of healthcare workers, the NCOC said at least 72,882 frontline health workers have been vaccinated across the country and overall 314,500 Covid-19 vaccine shots have been provided to various parts of the country.
The second consignment of coronavirus vaccine has been provided to the provinces, as the vaccination drive for health workers is underway across the country, the NCOC said in a statement.
Punjab has been provided overall 118,000 vaccine shots, while Sindh has been given 121,000 vaccine jabs, the NCOC added in the statement.
Moreover, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) has been supplied 28,000 vaccines, besides 16,000 to Balochistan, 15,500 to Islamabad, 11,000 to Azad Kashmir and 5,000 to Gilgit-Baltistan region, according to the NCOC.
Earlier, the second consignment of coronavirus vaccine reached Karachi overnight as an aircraft carrying the vaccine consignment of Chinese Sinopharm landed in Karachi.
The director of Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) Sindh has stated that additional 37,000 doses of the vaccine have been provided to the province.
In a separate development, the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) will provide free-of-cost Covid-19 vaccine storage containers to Pakistan, following a grant from the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
Sources said the vaccine storage containers are likely to start arriving in the country in phases from mid-March, which will be used for storing the Pfizer vaccines, which need ultra-low temperatures up to -70 degrees. The cold chain system in Pakistan has a capacity of -20 degrees to store temperature-sensitive commodities.
The modern storage containers will be given to the Centre and provinces in the most affected areas. It emerged that the containers will initially be given to the 15 most-affected cities of the country, sources added.
Earlier on February 13, Pakistan decided to buy 21 ultra-cold modern refrigerators with an aim to store Pfizer vaccines as the country will start receiving doses of Pfizer vaccines from the Covax platform. Covid vaccine made by Pfizer may be stored in an ultra-cold freezer between -80 and -60 Celsius.
Covax ensures equitable worldwide access to Covid-19 vaccines with enough doses for countries to immunise more than three per cent of their populations by the mid of this year.
