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| - Bosnia received its first batch of Covid-19 vaccines on Thursday through the UN-backed Covax initiative to help poorer countries that has been slow to reach struggling nations in the Balkans. The shipment of 23,400 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech jab comes as the country is fighting a critical spike in coronavirus cases. An additional 26,400 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine are expected to be delivered later on Thursday, Civil Affairs Minister Ankica Gudeljevic said in a statement. Bosnia had been counting on more than 1.2 million doses promised by the Covax inititaive to carry out their immunisation campaigns and have expressed frustration about the long wait. "After these first quantities, I sincerely hope that the next deliveries will be made at regular intervals and in sufficient quantities," Gudeljevic said. With 1,827 deaths per million people, Bosnia has the world's sixth highest mortality rate per capita, according to an AFP count. In recent days, the Balkan nation of 3.5 million has registered a sharp increase of deaths, with 1,028 fatalities since the start of the month compared to a total of 392 in February. The country has recently managed to obtain more than 50,000 vaccine doses, including through donations from Serbia and Slovenia. The Covax global vaccine-sharing scheme was set up to ensure that 92 of the poorest countries in the world could access vaccines, with the cost covered by donors. The initiative was expected to deliver some 238 million doses around the world by the end of May and has far shipped more than 31 million doses. The scheme is co-led by the Gavi vaccine alliance, the WHO and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations. rus/ljv/ssm/har
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