(Reuters) -U.S. drugmaker Pfizer Inc and its German partner BioNTech SE said on Thursday they would supply Turkey with 60 million additional doses of their COVID-19 vaccine.
The latest agreement includes an option for 30 million extra doses, which would bring the total number of doses to be supplied to Turkey to 120 million, the drugmakers said http://newsfile.refinitiv.com/getnewsfile/v1/story?guid=urn:newsml:reuters.com:20210520:nGNX9bPMQt&default-theme=true in a joint statement.
All of the doses will be delivered in 2021, the companies added.
A deal for 120 million doses would be enough to inoculate 60 million people, a big portion of Turkey’s more than 80 million population.
The country, which has been using vaccines from China’s Sinovac Biotech and Pfizer/BioNTech, last month expected procurement to pick up pace in May, with the expected delivery of a shipment of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine.
Turkey has so far administered at least 26,537,163 doses of COVID vaccines, which is enough to vaccinate about 16% of its population, according to a Reuters tally. (https://tmsnrt.rs/2RqiZc0)
(Reporting by Manojna Maddipatla in Bengaluru; Editing by Aditya Soni)
