New COVID-19 vaccination centre opens in Abu Dhabi’s Masdar City
Facility offering shots to eligible groups on weekdays, 10am to 7pm
Abu Dhabi: A new vaccination centre has been opened at Abu Dhabi’s Masdar City.
The centre is part of the vaccination network operated by health provider, Mubadala Health, and is open from 10am to 7pm on weekdays.
In a statement, Masdar announced that the first vaccine dose is now freely available at the new centre for Emiratis and residents aged 50 years or more, for residents with chronic diseases and for People of Determination. Eligible residents can walk in without an appointment, and must present their Emirates IDs to receive the vaccine. They will also have to download Alhosn app on their phones.
“At Masdar City, we are delighted to continue our support of the fight against COVID-19 by hosting a vaccination centre. Mubadala Health has been doing incredible work via its network of vaccination centers and as Mubadala Group, we are honoured to support the UAE’s national goal of providing free COVID-19 vaccinations for all of the country’s citizens and residents,” said Abdulla Balalaa, acting executive director, Sustainable Real Estate at Masdar City.
“Masdar City is a growing hub of world-class sustainable technology innovators, including health care and biotech companies, and we are proud to incubate companies that bolster the UAE’s efforts to tackle the pandemic. As an example of this, the technology firm G42 opened one the largest COVID-19 testing facilities in the world in Masdar City in March 2020. This was the first testing centre of its scale to be operational outside of China. Housing a COVID-19 vaccination centre is therefore a natural next step for us,” he added.
Omar Al Naqbi, Acting Executive Director of Healthpoint, a Mubadala Health partner and one of the health care providers supporting the operations at the vaccination centers of Mubadala health, said the Masdar City facility is the latest addition to the Mubadala Health COVID-19 vaccination centre network.
“We are proud to be part of this vaccination program, which continues to demonstrate the UAE’s ability to mount an agile and effective response to the pandemic through collaboration between the public and private sectors. By leveraging Mubadala Health’s infrastructure and working with partners such as Masdar City, we can ensure that more segments of the population will have easy access to the vaccines. In addition, we are actively working on adding new vaccination centers and mobile clinics at various locations outside of our network and facilities,” Al Naqbi said.
Citizens and residents who wish to be vaccinated at the COVID-19 vaccination centre in Masdar City have been advised to use the car park outside of the Siemens building and follow the directional signage to the centre. Visitors can also use the chauffeured buggy service, which will bring them directly from the car park to the centre.
COVID-19 fight at Masdar
Masdar City is home to a number of companies supporting the UAE’s fight against the pandemic, including biotechnology maker Mondialab, which plans to start producing a wireless screening device called ‘The Resolute,’ providing health authorities with a preliminary indication of a patient’s exposure to COVID-19 within 10 minutes.
Similarly, Masdar City’s start-up business accelerator, The Catalyst, run by Masdar and BP, supports a tech firm called Volts that is working on a new generation of portable battery systems that store and distribute electricity from solar cells and wind turbines, which can be used to power remote field hospitals treating COVID-19 cases.