Government in Talks to Secure 21m Coronavirus Vaccine Doses

Iran is negotiating with four vaccine manufacturing countries to pre-order 21 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to halt the spread of the infectious disease that has killed over 50,000 Iranians over the past 10 months.
Kianoush Jahanpour, spokesman for Food and Drug Administration, said on Tuesday they are pursuing talks with four manufacturing companies that are awaiting regulatory approval to begin vaccine rollout, IRNA reported.
“If the talks finalize and Iran’s FDA approves the vaccines, they will be used. The approval of credible international organizations will influence FDA’s decision,” he added.
The 21 million doses add to the 16.8 million already pre-ordered through COVAX, a global initiative aimed at providing nations with equitable access to Covid-19 vaccines.
Citing the agreement signed by the government to buy the 16.8 million doses from the World Health Organization, Jahanpour said, “But sanctions cast a shadow on all vaccine purchases and financial transactions.”
The total of 37.8 million doses will be enough to vaccine nearly 19 million Iranians, as each person will need two injections to build up immunity against SARS-CoV-2.
Several local knowledge-based firms are also attempting to develop a vaccine against the respiratory illness and at least one has begun human trials, according to officials with the Health Ministry. 

Daily Deaths Again Rise Above 300 

Overnight deaths caused by the novel coronavirus remained under 300 only for two days and increased once again to 323 on Tuesday, spokeswoman of Health Ministry, Sima Sadat Lari, was quoted as saying by IRNA.
“The number of fatalities rose to 50,917,” she added. 
Over 11,000 tested positive for Covid-19 within one day, pushing the national tally of cases to 1.062 million.
Lari said, “Right now, 64 counties are on red alert, 278 are labeled orange and 106 are yellow.”
Recent stringent measures imposed by the National Coronavirus Headquarters has reduced the number of cities on red alert across the country by 96, but authorities warn that the public should not drop their guard against the pandemic due to its mild retreat.
“Iran has carried out some 6.477 million PCR tests since the deadly virus was spotted in the central city of Qom to detect infections,” Lari said.
“More than 754,000 have recovered from the infectious disease in the past 10 months and 5,780 are hospitalized in intensive care units.”
The number of coronavirus infections worldwide surged past 68 million on Tuesday and death toll reached 1.55 million.