An Airbus 330 jet carrying 550,000 vials of Sinopharm's vaccine has landed in Budapest, making Hungary the first European Country to roll out the Chinese-developed drug, CGTN reported on Wednesday.
The cargo includes enough vaccines to treat a quarter of the country's 10 million people. The shots will be distributed as soon as the authorities have inspected the delivery, Agnes Galgoczi, director of the epidemiology department at the National Public Health Centre, said during a virtual news conference.
The delivery is the first of four expected cargoes, which will total 5 million doses by end of May, Hungarian authorities said.
"We hope the vaccines can help all the countries in the world, including European nations to tackle the coronavirus pandemic and help their people recover health," China's ambassador to Hungary Qi Dayu said.
Hungary is buying COVID-19 vaccines from nations outside the EU's common acquisition program, saying that delays in the region's distribution are costing lives.
Last month, Hungary announced that it had sealed an agreement with Sinoppharm, or China National Pharmaceutical Group, to buy 5 million doses of its vaccine, one of two that China has been exporting around the globe.
Last week, Hungary became the first EU state to use Russia's Sputnik V vaccine.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has said he wants to be injected with the Sinopharm vaccine. Officials said they hope the country can be a European leader in COVID-19 immunizations.
But German Green Party MEP Reinhard Bütikofer expressed disbelief that Hungary would be able to inoculate the entire population by Easter as the prime minister has promised.
So far only about 3% of Hungary's population has been immunized.
As of Tuesday, Hungary had reported 389,623 COVID-19 cases since the pandemic broke out, with 13,836 fatalities.
