Kosovo received the first doses of vaccine against COVID-19 on Sunday evening.
The country received 24,000 AstraZeneca doses through the World Health Organization program, Covax and vaccination is planned to start next week.
First to be vaccinated in Kosovo will be the health workers of the Infectious Diseases Clinic of the University Clinical Center of Kosovo.
These doses of vaccine arrived in Kosovo from Amsterdam through Istanbul.
“This is a small contingent, but gives great hope in our country on starting to save the lives of people, especially our health personnel and population groups at risk,” Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti said.
He added that Kosovo is a small and poor country, therefore needs great support and solidarity from all, especially the United States of America and the European Union ‘who are also the main donors of the GAVI COVAX alliance’.
The Minister of Health, Arben Vitia said that despite the vaccination is about to begin, it does not mean that the end of pandemic is close, calling for citizens to respect imposed measures against Covid-19.
He said that that meetings with health institutions, organizations, and international partners are ongoing, to discuss on situation and decisions that need to be taken.
“We have already started intensive work to provide the next doses of the vaccine. As it was announced yesterday [on Saturday], the Western Balkans will benefit from the European Union another 650,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine,” Vitia said.
Kosovo is the only country in the Balkans that did not start the vaccination process.
Amid delays in the vaccination process, the Prime Minister of Albania Edi Rama said that his country is ready to vaccinate all doctors from Kosovo.
He made the statement on Thursday while receiving 192,000 doses of the Chinese vaccine against COVID-19, Sinovac.
Dozens of Kosovo health workers have already been vaccinated in Albania.
