KATHMANDU – China has announced an increase in grant assistance of Covid vaccines to 800,000 doses to Nepal.
Writing a tweet on Monday, Chinese Ambassador to Nepal Hou Yanqi said that the Chinese government has decided to increase Covid vaccines to Nepal to be provided under its grant assistance.
“In order to support Nepal’s fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chinese government has decided to increase grant assistance of vaccine for Nepal to 800,000 doses. Let us join hands to achieve the victory at an early date!” read the tweet.
Earlier, China had announced that it would provide Nepal a half million doses of Covid vaccines to Nepal.
Following the announcement of China, Nepal’s drug regulator Department of Drug Administration on February 17 had granted approval for the emergency use of COVID-19 vaccine developed by China’s Beijing Institute of Biological Products Co. Ltd, under Sinopharm.
This is the second Covid vaccine that Nepal has authorized for the emergency use in the country.
Earlier on January 15, the DDA had granted emergency use authorization of Covishield, a Covid vaccine developed by Oxford-AstraZeneca and manufactured by Serum Institute of India.
While Nepal had received one million doses of Covid vaccines from Indian government as part of its vaccine diplomacy, the Government of Nepal had decided to purchase 2 million doses of Covishield from India.
Out of two million doses ordered by the Government of Nepal, the Serum Institute of India has already delivered one million doses.
