Three planes of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) carrying a consignment of one million doses of COVID-19 vaccine left here on Sunday for Pakistan as the country sees sharp increase in new coronavirus cases.
Another consignment of two million doses of Covid-19 vaccine will also be transported from China by the national flag carrier on April 29, Qadir Bux Sangi, PIA Country Manager for China told APP.
Giving details, he said two special planes and a PIA regular flight was used to airlift the corona vaccine doses from China.
Read more: Pakistan can get the dangerous Indian COVID situation
It is pertinent to mention here that Pakistan has already begun vaccinating elderly people aged above 60-year-old and health professionals. The vaccination of people in the age group 50-59 has also been started from April 21. The National Command and Operation Centre started registering citizens above 50 years of age for COVID-19 vaccination from March 30.
Pakistan began a vaccination drive last month with over a million doses of Sinopharm vaccines donated by China.
Islamabad received first COVID-19 vaccine consignment after a military aircraft airlifted it from Beijing in February 1, this year.
First PIA aircraft taking Covid-19 vaccines from China arrives in at Islamabad international airport. Two more ✈️ of the national carrier will arrive during the day. All three aircrafts are bringing one million vaccines 💉 to Pakistan 🇵🇰 pic.twitter.com/fuGMbVP6Qi
— Naimat Khan (@NKMalazai) April 24, 2021
According to a senior Chinese official, the vaccine cooperation between Pakistan and China reflects the sincere mutual assistance between the two as all-weather strategic cooperative partners.
Cases rise
Since the pandemic outbreak, a total of 784,108 cases were detected that also included the perished, recovered and under treatment COVID-19 patients so far, including AJK 16,193, Balochistan 21,365, GB 5,241, ICT 72,150, KP 110,875, Punjab 282,469 and Sindh 275,815.
About 16,842 deaths were recorded in country since the eruption of the contagion. Around 4,576 have perished in Sindh among 14 of them died in hospital on Thursday.
Read more: COVID-19: Is Pakistan going to face oxygen supply crisis?
7,799 in Punjab had died with 81 deaths occurred in past 24 hours. 72 of them in the hospital and nine out of hospital. 3,029 in KP where 37 of them died in hospital and two out of hospital on Thursday, 652 in ICT among three deaths occurred in the hospital during past 24 hours, 227 in Balochistan among one of them died in hospital during past 24 hours, 104 in GB and 455 in AJK among six of them succumbed to the deadly virus in hospital on Thursday.
A total of 11,431,241 corona tests have been conducted so far, while 633 hospitals are equipped with COVID facilities. Some 5,534 corona patients were admitted in hospitals across the country.
Courtesy: APP