Islamabad: Pakistan’s Senate Deputy Chairman Saleem Mandviwalla has announced that an order of 200,000 vaccines for COVID-19 has been placed to administer to parliamentarians, staff members of the Senate and their families.
In an interview with a private news channel, the deputy chairman said the order has been placed through the embassy of China in Pakistan.
He said that he had asked Dr Faisal Sultan, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on Health if the government was unable to decide and procure, the private sector should be allowed to acquire it.
Dr Sultan made it clear the government had already given approval and the private sector could procure, he said. Therefore, we have placed an order for the Chinese vaccines for the Senate members, staff and parliamentarians, he said.
Pakistan has so far approved three coronavirus vaccines — the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, the vaccine developed by Chinese state-owned firm China National Pharmaceutical Group (SinoPharm) and Russian-developed Sputnik V.
Karachi colleges report surge in cases
Meanwhile, coronavirus cases have reportedly increased in the government-run colleges across Karachi, according to official data.
The first among the colleges with the highest number of COVID-19 cases is the Sir Syed Government Girls College where about 58 staff members have tested positive.
Shaheed-e- Millat Girls College comes second with 21 staff members getting infected with COVID-19.
Recently, three districts in Karachi reported 100 per cent increase in the coronavirus positivity rate in the past week, Sindh Health Department said Friday. The province’s health department said the spike in coronavirus positivity rates can be attributed to the fact that people have quit following the Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).
Chinese vaccine to arrive by January end
Pakistan’s parliamentary secretary for Health has revealed that China has assured to supply COVID-19 vaccine before the end of January.
Chinese government has assured that it will supply 500,000 vaccines to Pakistan by January 31, said Dr Nausheen Hamid adding in the first phase, frontline health workers will be administered vaccine shots.
So far, we have registered more than 300,000 health workers in the country.
46 deaths, 1,644 new cases in 24 hours
Pakistan’s cases of COVID-19 surged to 541,031 with 1,644 new cases in the last 24 hours. Similarly, with 46 fatalities in the same period, Pakistan’s toll due to COVID-19 has reached 11,560. According to the National health ministry’s portal, there are 2,133 critical cases of COVID-19 in the country while after 43,381 tests in one day, the country reported 32,726 active cases and 2,167 patients recovered in this period. Pakistan’s total recoveries from COVID-19 have reached 496,745.
