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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Palestinians get Chinese Covid vaccine doses

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RAMALLAH: The Palestinian Authority received 100,000 doses of the Chinese Sinopharm jab last week, the largest single batch of coronavirus vaccines yet to reach the Palestinian territories.


The PA’s vaccination campaign was launched this month after the delivery of thousands of vaccines through the Covax programme which is meant to ensure an equitable access to Covid-19 jabs.


The Palestinian vaccine rollout has lagged well behind that of Israel, which has faced criticism for excluding most Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip from its world-beating vaccination drive.


The latest jabs “represent a commitment to the promise China made to put vaccines at the service of the world,” Chinese ambassador to the PA, Guo Wei, told reporters in Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.


Palestinian health minister Mai al Kaila said the delivery would “greatly contribute to accelerating the community vaccination campaign,” as the number of infections in the West Bank continues to rise. The PA announced it had started vaccinating the over-75s and some medical patients on March 21 after receiving 60,000 vaccine doses through Covax.


More than 20,000 of those doses have been transferred to Gaza, which Israel has blockaded since Hamas seized the coastal strip in 2007. An additional 60,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine have been delivered to Gaza from the UAE, shipments brokered by a former top PA official currently exiled in Abu Dhabi, Mohammed Dahlan. — AFP


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