Pak administers over 500,000 jabs in a day amid virus surge
Minister hopes vaccination drive will gather pace in future; PM calls on countries producing vaccines to ramp up production; international flight operations to be increased to 50% from tomorrow
Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Asad Umar on Tuesday said that more than 500,000 people got vaccinated against COVID-19 in a single day, which was the highest number since the vaccination started in the country.
“For the first time, we crossed half a million doses of vaccinations yesterday. 525,000 doses were administered,” he said.
In a tweet, the minister said out of the total, 390,000 people were administered first doses.
He hoped that this pace would further increase in future.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Imran Khan urged the countries that are producing the coronavirus vaccines to ramp up production and work to ensure that these are rapidly distributed throughout the world, including developing countries.
“While the support offered by some major countries is commendable, more needs to be done,” Imran said during his address to the United Nations High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development 2021.
The National Command and Operations Centres ( NCOC) said that international flight operations will be increased to 50% from July 15.
“The decision to increase international flight operations has been made to repatriate Pakistanis stranded abroad,” the NCOC said.
Earlier, a report said that just over 6,000 people have experienced side effects of coronavirus vaccination in Pakistan.
Among 3.5 million fully vaccinated and 14.7 million partially vaccinated people across the country, only over 6,000 people faced adverse effects.
Health Secretary Aamir Ashraf Khawaja said it is absolutely insane to think that the side effects of the vaccine could take your life, or could cause some sort of disorder in your body system.
Drug Regulatory Authority Pakistan ( DRAP) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Asim Rauf said that vaccination is the single most effective way to reduce deaths and severe illnesses from COVID-19.
Adviser to Prime Minister on Health Dr Faisal Sultan said that vaccines are available at all centres and around 400,000 people are being vaccinated daily.
According to the latest COVID-19 weekly safety report of Australia and the government of the United Kingdom, vaccination is the single most effective way to reduce severe illness and death from COVID-19 infections. The research work also reflects that the deaths reported with suspicion due to COVID-19 vaccines were very low.
Leaving unreported cases aside, the deaths from coronavirus are about 2.3 per cent of the total reported cases in Pakistan. Whereas, the reported Adverse Events Following Immunization (AEFI) from geting coronavirus vaccination stands extremely minimal at 0.0003 per cent of both partial and fully vaccinated people across the country.
Scientists and experts of health believe that all vaccines and medicines have some side effects. These reactions are not associated with more serious illness but are rather likely to reflect an expected, normal immune response to the vaccines. Experts also said that most of the deaths occur due to the health history of the patient rather than due to COVID-19 vaccines. The chances of fatality due to corona may be one in thousands if not even lesser.
With the arrival of the fourth wave being most deadly in nature according to experts, geting oneself vaccinated should be highly appreciated. It is sort of a public service, said Asim Rauf.
Khawaja said the authorities might reach full capacity which is up to one million doses per day to achieve the target of 70 million vaccinations by the end of this year. Elaborating about the safety of COVID-19 vaccines, the official said that each of the vaccines administered in Pakistan has gone through a thorough research consisting of four stages of trials to evaluate its effectiveness and efficiency which are also followed by every country around the world.
“Fity per cent of the population of Pakistan does not want themselves to be vaccinated according to surveys and we need 70 per cent of people to get vaccinated to ensure herd immunity across the country,” Khawaja said adding, “We must be fearful of this new variant ‘Delta’ and people should rush to vaccination centers if they actually pay any heed to themselves.”