Israel to ship soon-to-expire vaccine doses to South Korea
The Palestinian Authority rejected a similar agreement last month.
The Israeli government agreed to send COVID-19 vaccine doses to South Korea on Tuesday after the Palestinian Authority rejected a similar Israeli offer.
Israel and the Republic of Korea signed a mutual vaccine supply agreement. Israel will “immediately” transfer 700,000 Pfizer vaccine doses to Seoul, which will administer them to citizens by the end of July. South Korea will send the same amount of doses from a future order to Israel in September of October, according to a press release from Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s office.
“South Korea will receive vaccines from our existing stocks and we will receive vaccines from their future shipment,” said Bennett. “Thus we are plugging the holes and we will ensure that the State of Israel has a proper stock of vaccines.”
The doses from Israel will expire at the end of July. Israel previously attempted to give the batch to the Palestinian Authority, which rejected them due to the pending expiration date, according to Israeli media outlets. Palestinian officials said the expiration date was actually in June.
