Egypt announced on
Wednesday that it has administered slightly more than 21 million second
coronavirus vaccine shots since the country started its vaccination campaign
early this year.
This means that Egypt has fully vaccinated slightly over 20 percent of its 102.8 million population, falling short of the World Health Organization’s global target for countries to fully vaccinate 40 percent of their populations by the end of 2021.
The country has also administered first coronavirus vaccine shots to 34.6 million people, acting Health Minister Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar told a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday.
Egypt has so far imported over 119 million COVID-19 vaccines, Abdel-Ghaffar said, noting that around 64.3 million doses are still available.
This includes recent shipments of 2.3 million vaccines delivered through COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX), including about 1.5 million Pfizer shots, 462,000 Moderna shots, and 352,800 AstraZeneca shots.
Egypt has been battling a fourth wave of the coronavirus pandemic since early August. Moreover, it has detected its first three cases of the new highly transmissible variant Omicron in Egyptian nationals who had returned from abroad at Cairo International Airport.
Source: The Egyptian Gazette
