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Egypt’s COVID-19 Vaccines in Final Stages of Planning

city life COVID-19 Culture egypt Egyptians Vaccines
Egypt’s COVID-19 Vaccines in Final Stages of Planning
written by
Cairo 360

Image credit: Anna Davila for Getty Images

The Ministry of Health and Population has assigned 34 medical centres across all 27 governorates to start the administration of the coronavirus vaccine from Sinopharm, China. The first batch of vaccines was received in December and is now being distributed across the country, where Cairo and Giza, the heaviest populated governorates, will have three centres each. Alexandria and Qalyubiyya will each have two centres, and the remaining governorates will each house one centre. Vaccinations will begin by the end of January.

On Monday the 4th of January, Minister of Health and Population, Hala Zayed, along with several healthcare officials, inspected the Kattameya Medical Center. In cooperation with the Engineering Authority of the Armed Forces, the tour was made to coordinate the general site and ensure all the centre’s facilities are up to standard within 48 hours. The Kattameya Medical Center is one of Cairo’s most distinguished medical centres, which also participated in the clinical trials of the new COVID-19 vaccines as part of its “For Humanity” initiative. The centre will be one of the main vaccine distribution points in Cairo.

Image credit: University of Michigan News

High-risk individuals with underlying medical conditions, frontline medical workers, the elderly, and patients suffering from severe COVID-19 symptoms will be on a high-priority list, and they’ll be first to receive the vaccine. In its third phase of the clinical trials, the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine has been tested by healthcare officials, and it has been proven to be 79% effective and safe for widespread use.

Vaccinations are still optional, and will be available to anyone over 18 years old. More variations of the vaccine will be made possible in Egypt soon, including vaccinations by GAVI of Switzerland, and Pfizer of the United States of America.

According to English Ahram, the Egyptian government reported 1,119 new coronavirus cases and 55 deaths on Tuesday alone, bringing the total number of infections to 144,583 and the total number of deaths to 7,918 since the outbreak in February 2020.

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