Australia and New Zealand have received their first corona vaccines. The countries want to start vaccinating people later this month.
“The Eagle has landed”, Australia’s Health Minister Greg Hunt exulted. There, a plane landed in Sydney on Monday afternoon (local time) with vaccines’ first shipment. Australia has received 142,000 doses of the drug from Pfizer / BioNTech, which is also already used in the Netherlands. Authorities will begin vaccinating civilians on February 22.
In New Zealand, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced that the first 60,000 doses of the same vaccine had arrived. There will be a start next weekend with the vaccination of people who work at the border.
“This will be the largest vaccination campaign in the history of our country,” Ardern predicted. “We have bought enough vaccines for all New Zealanders, and they are provided for free.”
The island states have weathered the corona pandemic better than many Western countries. With a population of nearly 5 million, New Zealand has reported 2,330 cases of corona and 25 deaths. In the more excellent Australia, where about 25 million people live, there are approximately 29,000 infections and 909 corona patients who have died.