Ukraine has received over 367,200 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine on April 23.
This is the country’s fourth batch of vaccine. A total of 1.2 million doses has come in so far, enough to fully vaccinate 600,000 people, 1.4% of Ukraine’s population of 42 million.
COVAX, the global coronavirus vaccine alliance provided the new batch for free. Altogether, Ukraine will receive at least 8 million free doses from the program.
This Ukraine’s second COVAX package. On April 16, the country got 117,000 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine from the program.
The new shipment contains the same type of vaccine that Ukraine got on Feb. 23, except it comes from South Korea instead of India.
So far, Ukraine has been administering the AstraZeneca vaccine to medical workers who treat coronavirus patients, front line troops and people over 80. The new batch will be distributed among the people over 65, according to the Ministry of Health. Leftover doses will be used to give second shots.
In total, 508,044 people have received their first doses of the vaccine as of April 22.
Currently, Ukraine has vaccines from three producers: AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BioNTech and SinoVac.
The first phase of the vaccination drive, which began on Feb. 24, targeted 367,000 top priority people, including doctors who treat COVID‑19 patients and soldiers in Donbas.
On March 22, the campaign moved into its second phase, giving shots to family doctors, other medical workers, social workers and people over 80, in addition to all members of the first phase group.
The Health Ministry aims to vaccinate half of the population, 21 million people, by the end of the year.
