COVID-19 in Egypt: 72 M doses administered to 50% of target groups

CAIRO – 3 March 2022: Egypt has provided 143 million doses of the coronavirus vaccines from December 2020 to March 2, 2022, said Acting Minister of Health Khaled Abdel Ghaffar in a report submitted during a Cabinet meeting on Thursday.

 

He added that about 72 million doses have been given to the citizens so far, immunizing about 50% of the target groups. The minister added that about 1.1 million booster doses were administered to priority groups. The government is targeting to vaccinate 72 million people aged above 12 years old.

 

As for vaccinating children aged between 12 and 15, Abdel Ghaffar said that the ministry provided 325,722 doses and 121, 638 in the first and second phases, respectively. Meanwhile, children aged at 15 to 18 years were administered 1.286 million doses in the first phase, and 769,000 shots in the second phase.

 

The Health Ministry said 1,288 new coronavirus cases were detected, upping the total number of confirmed infections since the beginning of the outbreak in the country to 486,381.

 

This is the lowest daily coronavirus count recorded by the country since January 18 amid a significant drop in cases over the past days.

 

In a statement, spokesman for the Health Ministry Hossam Abdel Ghaffar said 22 patients have died from the virus over the past 24 hours, raising the death toll to 24,132.

 

As many as 981 patients were discharged from isolation hospitals after receiving necessary medical care, taking the number of recovered cases to 416,471 so far, the spokesman said.

 

Egypt has so far administered 40,210,422 first coronavirus vaccine shots; 30,242,662 second shots; and 1,131,879 booster shots.

 

On Tuesday, Egypt’s Acting Health Minister Khaled Abdel Ghaffar held a press conference to announce the start of clinical trials for the Egyptian vaccine EgyVacc.

 

This is the second locally made vaccine after CoviVacc, whose clinical trials started in November.