Denmark to donate unused AstraZeneca jabs to Kenya

A nurse holds up a jab of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. /AP/Andreea Alexandru.

Denmark will donate 358,700 unused vaccine doses to Kenya, saying the batch of Astra Zeneca that expires July 31 should be delivered as soon as possible.

It is part of the 3 million doses that Denmark has earmarked for donation this year.

“No one is safe until everyone is safe,” Denmark’s Foreign Aid Minister Flemming Moeller Mortensen said in a statement. “Kenya is in a difficult situation as they have received far fewer vaccines than they should have had.”

The donation will be shipped via the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF.

In March, Denmark became the first country in Europe to remove the AstraZeneca jabs from its vaccination program over a potential link to a rare but serious form of blood clot.

Norway followed Denmark, and many countries in Europe and elsewhere followed suit. They later resumed using the shot after the European Medicines Agency said that it was safe but with some restricting it to certain age groups, mostly those above age 50 or 60.

Cgtn.com