Yemen gets first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines
The AstraZeneca doses arrived in Yemen as Doctors Without Borders warned of a dramatic increase in coronavirus cases.
Yemen received its first batch of COVID-19 vaccines, the United Nations children’s agency (UNICEF) said on Wednesday, as the war-torn country’s strained health care system grapples with an uptick in cases.
Some 360,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were supplied to Yemen through the global COVAX vaccine-sharing program. The vaccines, which arrived by plane in the de facto capital of Aden, are the first shipment of a total 1.9 million doses Yemen is scheduled to receive throughout 2021.
UNICEF representative Philippe Duamelle said the vaccines come at a critical moment for the country.
“Yemen now has the capacity to protect those most at risk, including health workers, so that they can safely continue to provide life-saving interventions for children and families,” he said. "Vaccines work, vaccines save lives, now let’s start getting people vaccinated.”
