The health ministry aims to procure 80 million doses of the Sinovac vaccine in total by the end of 2021 in order to fully inoculate 40 million Egyptians Safety testing of the Sinovac vaccine has been completed and a meeting scheduled to present a final report and approve the manufactured doses CAIRO: Five million doses of the Sinovac vaccine manufactured domestically will be sent to Egyptian vaccination centers by Sept. 1, advisor to the health minister Dr. Noha Assem has said. The health ministry earlier announced that it aimed to procure 80 million doses of the Sinovac vaccine in total by the end of 2021 in order to fully inoculate 40 million Egyptians. Assem said in a televised statement that the average number of coronavirus infections in hospitals this week grew from last week, adding that a fourth wave of COVID-19 cases is expected in September. She added that vaccine supplies ordered from abroad have begun to arrive and that the new government target is to vaccinate between 400,000 and 800,000 citizens per day. “That is why the number of vaccination centers has increased and huge preparations are underway,” she said. Khaled Megahed, spokesman for the ministry, said that the doses of the locally manufactured Sinovac vaccine will be released by the Egyptian Holding Company for Biological Products and Vaccines within two to three days. Megahed said that safety testing of the vaccine had been completed and a meeting was scheduled to present a final report and approve the manufactured doses. He said that 1 million doses had already been produced, adding that initial results were “very promising.” There are sufficient manufacturing components to produce 14 million total doses domestically, he said. Dr. Mohamed Abdel-Fattah, head of the central department of preventive affairs, said that Minister of Health Dr. Hala Zayed directed an increase in the number of vaccine centers to 657 and offices for vaccinating travelers to 145. Zayed also issued instructions for the vaccination of university and school students. Students are exempt from government vaccine registration and will instead receive jabs through universities, under the supervision of deans. Egypt has obtained five types of vaccines — Sinopharm, Sinovac, Sputnik, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson — and is now awaiting the arrival of 2 million doses of the Pfizer jab.