COLOMBO: Sri Lanka has received 500,000 doses of Sinopharm coronavirus vaccine donated by China as the Indian Ocean island nation faces severe shortage of vaccines amid a recent rise in infections.
The vaccine stock that arrived early Wednesday is the second donation from China, following a shipment of 600,000 doses in March.
Sri Lanka is facing a shortage of vaccine after the producer in neighboring India failed to provide the promised Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine stocks.
The government on Tuesday agreed to buy 14 million doses of Sinopharm from China.
The current vaccination program is focused on Sri Lanka's Western province, which includes the capital of Colombo and its suburbs.
It is where the majority of the country's coronavirus cases have been.
Sri Lanka so far has reported 167,172 coronavirus cases and 1,243 deaths from COVID-19.