Pakistan lowers age for vaccinations

Authorities in Pakistan have decided to start vaccinating people aged 50 to 59 next week, hours after the country reported over 100 fatalities in a single day for the fifth consecutive day.

Saturday's figures bring Pakistan's death toll from the pandemic to 16,094, out of more than 750,000 total confirmed cases in the country of some 233 million people.

Federal authorities said 4,149 patients were in critical care hospital units.

Pakistan has largely relied on donated or imported Chinese vaccines, which had been offered only to health workers and elderly people. But they have not responded in overwhelming numbers to the vaccination campaign, prompting officials to offer the vaccines to a younger cohort.

Pakistan hopes to receive 15 million COVID-19 vaccine doses through the UN-backed COVAX program by next month.