Ethiopia’s Ministry of Health launched its COVID-19 vaccination rollout, with Health Care Workers as the first to be inoculated on Saturday in the country’s capital, Addis Ababa.
Earlier last week, the East African country successfully secured nine million doses of COVID-19 vaccines up until April. The first shipment of 2.2 million AstraZeneca vaccines produced by Serum Institute of India (SII) arrived in Ethiopia on 6 March 2021 through COVAX, which facilitated the procurement and shipment of the vaccines. Subsequent shipments of 5.4 million doses as part of the current global deployment plan are expected to arrive in Ethiopia by May 2021.
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“With the introduction of vaccines, we are now at a landmark stage in the response to COVID-19.” says Education Minister, Dr. Getahun Mekuria.
With its current statistics at over 175,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases and over 2,500 deaths, Ethiopia aims to vaccinate 20% of the population by the end of 2021.
