The Palestinian Ministry of Health began administering the first coronavirus vaccines received during the global COVAX campaign on Sunday.
The World Health Organization and its partners running the COVAX program delivered 61,400 vaccines to the Palestinian Authority (PA) on Wednesday; with 21,300 deported to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.
The other 40,000 sights are an incentive for the West Bank, where the PA has struggled to buy vaccines.
Prior to the COVAX delivery they received only 10,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine and 2,000 doses from Israel for nearly 5 million residents.
In contrast, Gaza, which has been under Israeli-Egyptian blockade to isolate Hamas, has received more than 80,000 doses, mostly down to rival President Mahmoud Abbas.
Mohammed Dahlan, who has been based in Abu Dhabi since falling out with Abbas in 2011, has delivered 60,000 blows to Gaza and pledged more, embarrassing Abbas ahead of planned elections in May.
At the Gaza City clinic, five WHO staff and five local medical staff, representing priority vaccine groups, were the first to be ingested with doses administered by COVAX.
Sacha Bootsma, head of the WHO Gaza office, who received the first glimpse of a vaccine at the event has said that “there are still not enough vaccines in Gaza at the moment.”
The vaccines delivered under COVAX were Pfizer and AstraZeneca, distributed in Palestinian regions for the first time.
Gaza has been hit by the pandemic since August, and has recorded 582 deaths and more than 58,000 infections.
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