Karachi: Pakistan received on Wednesday two million doses of the Chinese-manufactured SinoVac Covid-19 vaccine as the country struggles with vaccine shortage.

A special Pakistan International Airline (PIA) plane carrying the vaccines arrived in Islamabad on Wednesday as part of the planned contracted quantity purchased from China, DAWN reported.

"The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) is spearheading the process of purchasing vaccines from the international market under the auspices of the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC)," a statement by the NCOC said.

The statement further said that these vaccines will be deployed to all vaccine centres across Pakistan. With these vaccines, the daily average administering of doses across Pakistan will be enhanced considerably, NCOC said.

NCOC revises gap for second dose of SinoVac, Sinopharm vaccines

Last week, the country received 1.55 million doses of the SinoVac vaccine. The arrival of these consignment comes at a time when vaccination centres in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and Rawalpindi have been facing a shortage of vaccines.

Due to limited doses, the NCOC has increased the gap between the two-dose Chinese SinoVac and Sinopharm vaccines. Now the gap for both the vaccines has been increased to six weeks.

During the last 24 hours, 375,159 people were administered the vaccine across the country. Since Pakistan started its immunization drive this year, over 13 million people have been inoculated.