UPDATES WITH REMARKS BY HEALTH MINISTER
By Seda Sevencan
ISTANBUL (AA) – Turkey has administered over 113.18 million doses of coronavirus vaccines since the country launched an immunization drive in January, according to official figures released on Wednesday.
More than 54.67 million people have been given a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while around 46.77 million are fully vaccinated, the Health Ministry said.
Turkey has also given third booster shots to more than 10.81 million people.
Separately, the ministry also recorded 31,248 new coronavirus cases, 236 deaths, and 30,331 recoveries over the last 24 hours.
As many as 361,164 virus tests were conducted over the past day.
Following a meeting of the Coronavirus Scientific Advisory Board, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said on Twitter that nearly 40% of current active cases is made up of people under the age of 23.
The average age of the infected people has started to go down after the reopening of schools, Koca recalled, warning against a rise in cases.
With the universities resuming in-class learning as well, Koca called on students to get vaccinated in order to continue their education without interruption.
On the homegrown vaccine called TurkoVac, Koca said a Phase 3 study, in which the vaccine candidate is administered as a booster shot after two doses of COVID-19 vaccine, is going on.
He called on volunteers who have received already two doses of coronavirus vaccine to participate in the human trials.
The inactive vaccine, jointly developed by the Turkish Health Ministry, Health Institutes of Turkey, and the Erciyes University, has successfully completed Phase 1 and 2 trials in Turkey.
Since December 2019, the pandemic has claimed over 4.87 million lives in at least 192 countries and regions, with more than 238.96 million cases reported worldwide, according to US-based Johns Hopkins University.