Sharjah24 – Reuters: Singapore has excluded those who received Sinovac Biotech's shots from its national COVID-19 vaccination count, according to the city-state's health ministry.

"The national vaccination numbers reflect only those vaccinated under the national vaccination programme," the ministry said in an emailed statement on Wednesday.

Currently, this only includes those vaccinated with the Moderna Inc and Pfizer-BioNTech/Cominarty vaccines, it said.

Sinovac's CoronaVac shot is not part of Singapore's national vaccination programme and the city-state has said it is still awaiting critical data from the company.

It has, however, allowed the usage of the vaccine by private healthcare institutions under a special access route, following an emergency use approval by the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Selected private clinics can draw on the country's current stock of 200,000 CoronaVac doses.

About 3.7 million people have received at least one dose of the Pfizer or Moderna's vaccines, covering about 65% of the population, and nearly 2.2 million have completed the regimen.

Singapore has set a target for two-thirds of its people to complete the two-dose regimen by around Aug. 9.