The Chinese government has increased its donation of COVID-19 vaccines to the Maldives from 100,000 to 200,000 vaccine doses.

The announcement was made by the Chinese Ambassador to the Maldives, Zhang Lizhong after meeting Maldives’ Foreign Minister, Abdulla Shahid on Thursday, according to avas.mv.

The Chinese government had last year announced to donate 100,000 doses of its homegrown Sinopharm vaccine.

The Chinese ambassador said a further 100,000 vaccines will be donated to the Maldives, taking the total number of doses to 200,000. This will enable 100,000 people to get vaccinated with two vaccine doses each. The Maldives has a total population of around 557,426 people, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

The Maldives initiated its national COVID-19 vaccine drive on February 1.

Currently, only the Covishield vaccine manufactured in India under a special license from AstraZeneca is being administered in the Maldives.