KATHMANDU: The France government has just delivered 702,720 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech’s bivalent COVID-19 vaccines to Nepal through the COVAX Facility, offering a boost to the country’s ongoing COVID-19 vaccination drive.
This latest donation had been divided into separate shipments received across the months of June and July, with the final installment of the donation having arrived at the Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu today.
France had been the first country worldwide to donate vaccines to the COVAX mechanism when global COVID-19 vaccination efforts began in early 2021. In the years since, France has remained one of the top donors to COVAX, a testament to the Government’s commitment to supporting vaccine coverage worldwide, especially in vulnerable countries hit hard by the pandemic.
Speaking at the handover ceremony, French Ambassador to Nepal Gilles Bourbao reiterated one of France’s key positions: Working with partners in multilateral platforms to address global issues, the COVID-19 crisis being no exception.
France had previously donated 685,400 doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines to Nepal through COVAX in 2022, and more recently, 195,840 of the Pfizer-BioNTech’s bi-valent vaccines as part of a joint Team Europe donation in April 2023.
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