Over 109.15M vaccine jabs administered in Turkey to date

By Zehra Nur Duz

ANKARA (AA) – Turkey has administered over 109.15M million coronavirus vaccine jabs since the country launched an immunization drive in January, according to official figures released on Wednesday.

Some 53.76 million people have been given a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while over 44.3 million are fully vaccinated, the Health Ministry said.

According to the data, some 86.4% of Turkey’s adult population has now received at least one dose of a two-shot vaccine.

Turkey has also given third booster shots to more than 10.2 million people.

The ministry recorded 29,386 new coronavirus cases, 227 fatalities, and 31,018 recoveries over the past day.

As many as 355,442 virus tests were done in the past 24 hours.

A quarter of all active cases in Turkey at the moment are in the 5-17 age group, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said in a statement after a meeting of the country’s COVID-19 committee.

“Considering that this group is not included in the vaccination program to a large extent, I want to say that the new cases being seen in our children is an expected situation,” he said.

Since December 2019, the pandemic has claimed over 4.76 million lives in at least 192 countries and regions, with more than 233 million cases reported worldwide, according to the US’ Johns Hopkins University.