After three months of reliance on the CoronaVac inactive vaccine, Turkey is finally gearing up to acquire its first COVID-19 vaccine from another source: Pfizer-BioNtech. The messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine is expected to be available soon, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca announced early Thursday.
Following a meeting of the Ministry of Health’s Coronavirus Scientific Advisory Board, Koca stated that 58,000 doses of the vaccine, which will be tested before granted approval, arrived in the country, and added that another 4.5 million doses will arrive by the end of March.
The vaccine, developed by Turkish scientists and couple Uğur Şahin and Özlem Türeci, is 95% effective in preventing COVID-19 cases. Several countries – including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union – have placed orders for millions of doses of the vaccine already.
Turkey started its mass vaccination campaign in January with CoronaVac which was developed by China’s Sinovac, first inoculating its health care workers. The country has gradually been administering the two doses of the vaccine to the public, first prioritizing elderly citizens. Koca said that the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccines would be offered to the next groups of people set to be vaccinated. Next week, the country will start vaccinating those between the ages of 60 and 65.
