Nepal Parliamentarians take first shot of Made-in-India COVID-19 vaccine

Kathmandu [Nepal], March 3 : Members of Nepal Parliament on Wednesday administered the first jab of Indian-made COVID-19 vaccine at Minbhawan based Civil Hospital in Kathmandu.
According to The Himalayan Times, Health Minister Hridayesh Tripathi, Speaker of the House of Representatives Agni Prasad Spakota, Co-chairs of Nepal Communist Party's (NCP) Dahal-Nepal faction Pushpa Kamal Dahal and Madhav Kumar Nepal, among others were inoculated against the virus.
This inoculation programme comes after the Cabinet meeting called by the Nepal Prime Minister (caretaker) KP Sharma Oli on February 26 has recommended President Bidya Devi Bhandari to call a meeting of the reinstated Lower House on March 7.
The drive was enforced by the Ministry of Health and Population as a fight against COVID-19 -- the first phase of which saw frontline health and sanitation workers being inoculated which was followed by the vaccines being administered on government employees, journalists, security personnel, among others, reported The Himalayan times.
On March 1, Nepal's Chief of Army Staff, Purna Chandra Thapa had received his first dose of the Made-in-India COVID-19 vaccine.
Last month, Nepal had received the second shipment of one million doses of the coronavirus vaccines from India. The AstraZeneca vaccine is manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII) under the name Covishield.
The second lot of vaccines would be used to inoculate people above 60 years of age, which is 8.73 per cent of Nepal's population, in the vaccination drive that will begin on March 7.
Nepal began its nationwide inoculation drive after receiving the first one million Covishield vaccines following the emergency use approval in January.
India, under the Vaccine Maitri initiative, has been providing coronavirus vaccines to its neighbouring countries.