Pakistan Ambassador to China Moin ul Haque on March 18 thanked the Chinese government for gift of 2nd batch of half a million doses of Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine which reached Pakistan. 

Last night, Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine was loaded in PAF aircraft at Beijing airport. "Thank you China for this gift of 2rd batch of half a million doses which has reached Pakistan today. Long live China-Pakistan friendship," according to the official Twitter account of the ambassador. 

The COVID-19 vaccine donated by the Chinese government had been handedover to the Pakistani authorities at a ceremony held at Noor Khan Air Base. 

The first batch of the COVID-19 vaccines provided by the Chinese government, which arrived in Pakistan on February 1, helped kick off Pakistan’s nationwide vaccination campaign, highlighting the friendship between the two countries. 

Later, the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) also delivered a batch of COVID-19 vaccine to the Pakistani military. Pakistani military was the first foreign military to receive the COVID-19 vaccine assistance from the Chinese military. 

Pakistan officially launched its National COVID-19 Immunization Program shortly after receiving the China-donated Sinopharm vaccines, with the frontline healthcare workers first inoculated. 

On March 10, Pakistan began vaccinating its people aged 60 years and over in the second phase of the nationwide vaccination. 

Besides Sinopharm and AstraZeneca, Pakistan has approved Russia’s Sputnik and China’s CanSino Biologics Inc's (CanSinoBIO) vaccines for emergency use. 

CanSinoBIO has released interim efficacy results from a multi-country trial, which included Pakistan, showing 65.7 percent efficacy in preventing symptomatic coronavirus cases and a 90.98 percent success rate in stopping severe infections. 

In the Pakistani subset, the efficacy of the CanSinoBIO vaccine at preventing symptomatic cases was 74.8 percent and 100 percent at preventing severe disease.