Over 27M COVID-19 vaccine shots given in Turkey to date

ANKARA

Turkey has administered over 27 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine since the launch of a mass vaccination campaign on Jan. 14, according to official figures.

As of Saturday, more than 15.87 million people have received their first doses, while over 11.87 million have been fully vaccinated, according to the Health Ministry data.

The ministry also confirmed a total of 8,697 new cases, including 835 symptomatic patients, across the country in the past 24 hours.

Turkey's overall case tally is now over 5.17 million, while the nationwide death toll reached 46,071 with 231 more fatalities over the past day.

As many as 14,472 more patients won the battle against the virus, taking the total number of recoveries over 5 million.

Over 52.1 million coronavirus tests have been done to date.

The latest figures show that the number of COVID-19 patients in critical condition stands at 1,876.

In a statement Saturday, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said the country has made deals to receive 100 million doses of Sinovac, 120 million doses of BioNTech and 50 million doses of Sputnik vaccines. He noted that 270 million doses of the vaccine were more than three times the population.

Turkey started a gradual normalization process on May 17 after a 17-day lockdown that significantly brought the infections down.

Until June 1, the country will enforce weeknight curfews from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m., while weekends will be under full lockdown.

Since December 2019, the pandemic has claimed over 3.4 million lives in 192 countries and regions, with more than 165 million cases reported worldwide, according to the US-based Johns Hopkins University.

The US, India, and Brazil remain the worst-hit countries in terms of the number of infections and deaths.