The Seychelles archipelago, off the coast of East Africa, is the first country on the African continent to be vaccinated against the Covid-19.
President Wavel Ramkalawan was the first to be vaccinated during a session at Victoria Hospital broadcast live on television and radio stations across the country. Several dozen personalities have also been injected with the vaccine.
Seychelles has received 50,000 doses of vaccine donated by the United Arab Emirates, with which it maintains close diplomatic contact. A good endowment, given the small population (95,000 inhabitants).
A Chinese vaccine, another British
The vaccine is not a Western vaccine but the first of those developed by the Chinese public laboratory Sinopharm with its subsidiary China National Biotec Group (CNBG). This vaccine, of inactivated virus type, was approved by Chinese health authorities on December 30 (and by Egypt on January 3). It should be administered in two doses.
On Monday, the vaccination campaign will extend to medical personnel, then to people working in essential sectors, then to people over 65 and finally to the entire population.
To date, the archipelago has recorded 508 cases of Covid-19, including 229 still positive, and one death. In recent days, the number of new cases has increased, including 57 new cases for Saturday alone.
President Ramkalawan said his country was also expecting 50,000 doses of the British-Swedish AstraZeneca / Oxford vaccine, a donation from the Indian government (which authorized the vaccine on January 3) which should arrive in Seychelles at the end of January.
The Covax program for poor countries
On Thursday, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced that the poorest countries would start receiving their first doses of vaccines between late January and mid-February as part of the international program. Covax.
This program aims to provide enough doses to immunize 20 percent of the population in each of the participating countries by the end of the year.
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