Israel to deliver over 1 million COVID-19 vaccines to Palestinian Authority

Israel to cede to Palestinian National Authority (PNA) in coming days 1 to 1.4 million doses of Pfizer vaccine against COVID-19 which are about to expire, the Israeli prime minister’s office reported on Friday.

In return, ANP has pledged to return to Israel the same amount of vaccine from Pfizer’s shipment that it expects to receive between September and October 2021, according to the agreement signed today by the parties in the first week of the new government led by the ultra-nationalist Naftali Bennett.

Israel launched one of the fastest vaccination campaigns in the world, which allowed him to lift restrictions to curb COVID-19, including the mandatory indoor mask this week.

Although the security fence separates most of the West Bank from Israel and there is an almost hermetic barrier between Israel and Gaza, the whole region is considered as an epidemiological unit.

According to the ANP’s Ministry of Health, until this week, 436,275 people had received at least one dose, and some 260,000 had received both doses; figures which include the more than 100,000 Palestinian workers that Israel has vaccinated since Marchbecause they come into regular contact with Israelis at their place of work.

It also includes some 52,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who have been vaccinated.

ANP received doses via COVAX, a global immunization program for poor and middle-income countries supported by the World Health Organization that seeks to provide enough free doses to immunize up to 20% of the population in each participating country.

COVAX intends to provide certain 400,000 AstraZeneca injections to Palestinians, according to UNICEF.

Palestinians suffered their worst COVID-19 wave in March and April, which peaked with almost 3,000 new cases per day; although after a strict shutdown the number fell to around 250 cases per day.

In Israel, the successful vaccination campaign – more than half of the population received the full vaccination schedule – reduced the number of new daily cases from 8,600 on average at the height of the health crisis to just 13 last Wednesday.

(With information from EFE)

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