India-made COVID vaccines arrive in Oman; reflects 'friendship spanning millennia'

A consignment of India-made vaccines arrived in Oman's capital city Muscat on Saturday, said External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar confirmed on Saturday. Jaishankar said that the delivery of vaccines to Oman "reflects friendship spanning millennia". The delivery of COVID-19 vaccines to Oman is part of the broader vaccine diplomacy currently being practised by India under which it has reportedly delivered more than 55 lakh doses so far. 

Read: COVID-19: India Records 13,083 Fresh Cases, 137 More Fatalities; Recovery Rate 96.98 Pc

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Anurag Srivastava on Thursday had said that India intends to deliver 1 lakh vaccine doses to Oman in the coming days. Srivastava had also said that India will gift vaccine doses to Caribbean nations and Pacific island states. India is also planning to give 10 million doses to Africa and 1 million to the United Nations under the GAVI's (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation) COVAX facility, a World Health Organisation (WHO) programme. 

Read: India, Bangladesh Foreign Secretaries Review Bilateral Ties, Discuss PM Modi's March Visit To Dhaka

55 lakh doses delivered so far

Srivastava also said that India has so far gifted over 5 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine to neighbouring countries, including Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Seychelles, and Mauritius. He added that New Delhi has also gifted 1 lakh doses of vaccines to Bahrain, which arrived in the Kingdom earlier on Thursday. 

Read: India's COVID-19 Active Cases Tally Contracts To 1.71 Lakh; Positivity Rate Drops To 5.50 Pc

According to Srivastava, out of the 55 lakh doses of vaccine donated so far, 20 lakh has been given to Bangladesh, 1.5 lakh to Bhutan, 10 lakh to Nepal, 15 lakh to Myanmar, 1 lakh to the Maldives, 1 lakh to Mauritius, 5 lakh to Sri Lanka, and 50,000 to Seychelles. India is supplying AstraZeneca-Oxford's COVID-19 vaccine that is being manufactured in the country at Serum Institute of India's facility in Pune. 

Meanwhile, India has commercially supplied COVID-19 vaccine doses to Brazil, Bangladesh, and Morocco. India has said that it plans on selling the vaccine doses to other countries as well, including Saudi Arabia, Canada, Mongolia, and South Africa. 

Read: India To Gift 10 Million Coronavirus Vaccine Doses To Africa, 1 Million To UN: MEA