Australia to send vaccines to virus hit Papua New Guinea

Australia will send COVID-19 vaccines from its own supply to its near-neighbour Papua New Guinea and will ask AstraZeneca to send more to try to contain a concerning wave of infections, Australia's prime minister said on Wednesday. Prime Minister Scott Morrison said 8,000 doses would be sent next week for Papua New Guinea's front-line health workers and he and his Papua New Guinea counterpart James Marape would ask AstraZeneca to send another one million doses as soon as possible.

The European Union this month blocked a shipment of more than 250,000 doses to Australia because the need for them was not considered great enough in a country largely successful in containing the coronavirus. Morrison told reporters in Canberra that he was making a "formal request" to AstraZeneca and European authorities for the doses "not for Australia, but for PNG".

Papua New Guinea is a poor country of almost nine million culturally diverse people who speak more than 800 languages and mostly live in traditional villages. The extent of the pandemic there is difficult to gauge because of a lack testing. Australian Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said half the women attending hospitals in the capital Port Moresby due to pregnancy were testing positive.

Large numbers of front-line health workers were also contracting COVID-19. Marape warned this week that one in three or four people in Papua New Guinea could soon be infected. Papua New Guinea is separated from the Australian mainland by an archipelago across the Torres Strait where residents have island-hopped between the two countries for generations.

Morrison announced new flight restrictions between the countries on Wednesday. The sea border has been closed due to the pandemic, but is difficult to police. Several recent COVID-19 cases detected in the Australian state closest to Papua New Guinea, Queensland, originated across the border. 

(Image Credits: AP)