Nepal recently announced that the second phase of its coronavirus vaccination drive will begin from Wednesday, using China-made Vero Cell vaccine— manufactured by the Beijing Institute of Biological Products in February this year.

Nepal has granted emergency approval to the Chinese Vero Cell vaccine, given the active caseload that stands at 277,944 on Monday, while 273,240 people have recovered in Nepal.

On March 29, a batch of the Chinese Covid-19 vaccines developed by Sinopharm was delivered to Nepal.

On Sunday, Nepal's Ministry of Health and Population made the announcement where it hinted that at least 4,00,000 people will be initially vaccinated using the Chinese drug for Covid-19. 

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Health, Dr. Jageshwor Gautam has said "As many as, 500,000 of the total 900,000 people targetted for vaccination have already received Covid vaccines. These 800,000 doses of China-donated vaccines will be administered to the remaining 400,000 people of the targeted group," he detailed in a press briefing.

"Those involved in essential services, students studying in China under the Chinese government scholarship but are currently stuck in Nepal due to pandemic, Nepali students preparing to leave for China for the higher study and people involved in cross-border trade between Nepal and China will be inoculated with the Chinese vaccine."

Meanwhile, Nepal reported 176 new Covid cases on Monday. In early March, the cases went down below 50 per day. Nepal has so far inoculated over 1.7 million people in two phases, according to the Ministry of Health and Population.

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