Iraq approves Sinopharm, AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines for emergency use

Cairo [Egypt], January 19 (ANI/Sputnik): The Iraqi authorities have approved the coronavirus vaccines by UK-Swedish company AstraZeneca and China's Sinopharm for emergency use, the Iraqi Ministry of Health said on Tuesday.
"The National Authority for Drug Selection has approved vaccines by the UK's AstraZeneca and China's Sinopharm for emergency use to fight the coronavirus pandemic," the ministry said in an official statement.
In late December, the Iraqi drug authority granted an emergency vaccination with the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. Following that, the director general of public health at the health ministry said that Baghdad plans to receive the first batch of the vaccine against COVID-19 sometime in February, as the country has secured a preliminary import deal for 1.5 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine.
As of now, the Iraqi health officials have registered 609,029 COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic, including 12,953 deaths. (ANI/Sputnik)