20m citizens vaccinated, says Dr Faisal Sultan

ISLAMABAD: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on National Health Services, Regulations and Coordination Dr Faisal Sultan on Wednesday said that the government is making sincere efforts to ensure the availability of the COVID-19 vaccine at all vaccination centres and more doses are expected to arrive soon, reported Geo News.

In a media briefing, Dr Sultan said that so far 20 million citizens have been vaccinated as the government secured sufficient doses in the month of June to ramp up the vaccination drive in the country.

He dismissed talk of vaccines having run out in Pakistan as "heresay" and said that shortages were a "global phenomenon". He said that the vaccine situation in the country would improve after June 20 when more vaccines would reach Pakistan. It is not clear which vaccines will be arriving at that time.

He said that the government was in contact with local and provincial administrations to make up the shortfall. “We are carrying out load balancing and redistribution locally to manage the situation across the country.”

Dr Faisal said: “We have two million doses available and vaccinations will continue to protect our citizens from carrying the coronavirus.” The premier’s aide on health said that there was no harm if the second dose of vaccine was delayed by six to eight weeks instead of a routine three to four-week duration in between jabs.

He advised citizens to strictly follow COVID-19 Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) in offices and markets to prevent the disease. “COVID-19 is a deadly virus but we can control it just as we controlled it by following the SOPs during the first and second waves.”

Meanwhile, the national tally on Wednesday of total active COVID-19 cases was recorded 39,905 with 1,038 more people tested positive for the deadly virus and 2,016 people recovered from the disease during the last 24 hours. National COVID positivity ratio during past 24 hours was recorded 2.46 percent.

Forty-six corona patients have died during past 24 hours, 45 of whom were under treatment in the hospitals and one out of the hospitals had perished in their respective quarantines or homes, according to the latest update issued by the National command and Operation Centre (NCOC). During the past 24 hours, most of the deaths have occurred in the Punjab followed by Sindh.

National Covid positivity ratio during past 24 hours was recorded 2.46 percent. Around 882,332 people have recovered from the disease so far across Pakistan making it a significant count with over 90 percent recovery ratio of the affected patients.