A top official said on Thursday, despite doubts about the
efficacy of Beijing’s product.
It comes as the number of coronavirus cases surged to
527,146 in Pakistan, with over 11,000 deaths since the virus was first detected
in February last year.
“I want to give the nation the good news that China has
promised to immediately provide 500,000 doses of vaccine to Pakistan by Jan.
31,” said Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi.
Qureshi spoke to his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi as pressure
mounted on the government to place orders for the import of one of the
available vaccines as the pandemic continues to rage in the country.
The Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) earlier
approved the use of two vaccines, those produced by European manufacturer
AstraZeneca and China’s Sinopharm.
Medical experts have raised doubts about the efficacy of the
Chinese vaccine, as Sinopharm has so far not made public the outcome of its
stage 3 clinical trials.
The government is leaving the private sector to import the
AstraZeneca vaccine, which might take months, according to local media reports.
China and Pakistan share a border and have been staunch
political allies for decades.
China is currently working on 62-billion-dollars worth of
road and rail infrastructure projects in Pakistan.
The work, known as the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC),
a collection of infrastructure projects related to Beijing’s ambitious Belt and
Road Initiative, aims to give China a land and sea route to markets in the
Middle East, Europe and Africa.