Pakistan develops homemade vaccine ‘PakVac’ with help from Chinese company

Islamabad: Pakistan’s National Institute of Health (NIH) has developed a homemade vaccine — PakVac — with the help of a Chinese vaccine company CanSinoBio.

The vaccine has been prepared after rigorous quality control checks and meets the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) standards.

The initial capacity is 100,000 doses per day and according to Prime Minister’s Special Assistant on Health, Dr Faisal Sultan, the product has passed the rigorous internal QA testing, an important step to help in the vaccine supply line.

With production of the homemade vaccine, Pakistan’s dependence on other countries for COVID-19 vaccine will significantly reduce, the government said on its official twitter handle.

After Dr Faisal Sultan’s tweet, social media was flooded with posts welcoming the new development.

Positivity at lowest level in last 10 weeks

Pakistan on Tuesday recorded a positivity rate of 4.82 per cent for COVID-19, the lowest positivity rate since March 10, 2021 when the country had recorded 4.5 per cent positivity.

According to the National Command & Operation Centre (NCOC), 46,726 tests were conducted in the last twenty-four hours that showed 2,253 new cases of COVID-19 and 92 deaths in the last 24 hours.

The country’s total number of COVID-19 cases after the fresh additions, has climbed to 905,852 while the death toll stands at 20,400.

However, despite this low positivity rate, there are 62,295 active cases of COVID-19 in the country, the NCOC portal further reveals.

Education Minister Shafqat Mehmood tests positive

Federal Minister for Education & Professional Training Shafqat Mehmood has tested positive for coronavirus, with mild symptoms.

Shafqat announced this, Tuesday, on his official twitter account.

Earlier in the day, Shafqat Mehmood had attended an event, before his test report came. PM’s Special Assistant on Youth Affairs Usman Dar was also present at the event.

250,000 people vaccinated in last 24 hours

With the vaccination drive fast picking up in the country, Pakistan administered 267,953 doses of vaccine, both the first and the second, in the last 24 hours.

Chairman of the NCOC and Federal Minister for Planning, Development & Special Initiative Asad Umar in a tweet announced that for the first time the number of doses administered in a day went beyond 250,000.