Fresh batches of 15m Sinovac doses arrive from China

The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has transported fresh consignments of 15 million doses of Sinovac Covid-19 vaccines by five special flights from the Capital International Airport Beijing to Islamabad.

The national flag carrier launched special flights PAK-6852, PAK-6853, PK-6856, PK-6857 and PK-6858 respectively and airlifted fresh consignments of Sinovac vaccine from December 10 to December 15, PIA Country Manager Qadir Bux Sangi said on Wednesday.

He added that a PIA special flight PK-6858 carrying 3 million doses of Sinovac Covid-19 vaccines left the Chinese capital for Islamabad.

Read more: People with health issues or inactivated vaccine should get Covid booster: WHO

Last week, Pakistan Ambassador to China Moinul Haque had thanked China for standing by Pakistan during testing times, including the fight against Covid-19.

"The vaccine campaign which is going [on] in Pakistan, the 90 per cent of it is being done through vaccines provided by China," he said.

In a recent statement, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson remarked that the China-Pakistan joint fight against the Covid-19 pandemic had achieved positive progress and set a good example for the world.

"Since the outbreak of Covid-19, our two countries have stood together in mutual assistance," he said in response to a question asked by APP.

He said that the Chinese side always attached high importance to Pakistan’s needs on vaccines and "we have engaged in close cooperation".

Also read: US lowers Covid travel warnings for Pakistan

The spokesperson said that China had provided strong support to Pakistan. Just a few days ago, he said, 200,000 doses of vaccines from China Red Cross Society were transported to Islamabad.

Chinese were already engaging in joint production of vaccines in Pakistan and it would stand together with Pakistan to help it defeat the virus, he added.

In an earlier statement, the spokesperson remarked that since the outbreak, China and Pakistan had been supporting each other. "When China was in the middle of the anti-epidemic war, Pakistan was among the first to help China," he added.

In the same way, he said, the Chinese side had been helping and assisting Pakistan with testing agents, masks protective suits and vaccines. "These were concrete steps illustrating iron brother relationship between the two countries."

As per the latest figures, Pakistan had vaccinated 25 per cent of its total population and 37 per cent of its eligible population against the novel coronavirus.

It is pertinent to mention here that Pakistan was the first country in the world, which received a coronavirus vaccine from China as a donation.

On February 1, 2020, the first batch of 500,000 doses of coronavirus vaccines donated by the Chinese government arrived by a special plane in Islamabad.

Later, on February 8, China's People’s Liberation Army (PLA) delivered a batch of Covid-19 vaccines to the Pakistan armed forces at the latter’s request.