Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Sunday received another 2 million COVID-19 vaccine doses from China, media s reported.
According to details, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) special flight PK 6853 airlifted another batch of two million doses of Sinovac vaccine from the Capital International Airport Beijing to Islamabad on Sunday.
A special flight PK 6852 had also transported a consignment of one million doses of Sinovac vaccine last Sunday. The Ministry of Health had received a batch of 1,000,000 doses of the SinoVac vaccine and 200,000 doses of the CanSino vaccine last week from China.
The federal government has expedited the imports of COVID-19 vaccines after the virus spread intensifies in the country.
The Chinese authorities have pledged to continue the uninterrupted supply of vaccines to help Pakistan defeat the ongoing wave of the deadly virus. Pakistan has so far received over 13 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines comprising of Sinopharm, Sinovac and CanSino procured from China including others through the COVAX programme.
Pakistan is already vaccinating its population of over 30-years and older citizens.
In a major achievement, Pakistan on Sunday successfully manufactured a COVID vaccine locally at the National Institute of Health (NIH) Islamabad.
“The vaccine was prepared by Pakistani experts under the supervision of a Chinese team,” they said adding that the second batch of the vaccine will be prepared solely by the Pakistani experts.
According to sources, overall 124,000 doses of single-dose CanSino vaccine were manufactured at the NIH and would be available for use from the next week.
