Phnom Penh: Cambodia’s next shipment of vaccines will arrive at Phnom Penh International Airport on Thursday morning. The one million doses of Sinopharm vaccine have been bought from China. The Ministry of Health has confirmed the shipment, saying the new doses will mean that, to date, just over 16 million doses of vaccine have been delivered to Cambodia.

As at 20 July, those doses have been administered to 6.2-million people, 4.19-million of whom have had two doses. The Royal Government is aiming to fully vaccinate 10-million adults before November, with the vaccination of children aged between 12 and 17 also being planned. The vast majority of inoculations have been carried out with Chinese-made vaccines, the dose interval for which was recently increased from 14 days to 21 days, in order to give people better protection.

More vaccines will arrive on Friday evening. The Japanese government is donating approximately one million doses of AstraZeneca. In August, a further four million doses of Sinovac and Sinopharm will be delivered. The Health Ministry recently announced that providing all vaccine orders arrive on time, Cambodia will meet its 10-million target ahead of schedule.