 St. Lucia has turned another major corner in the national response to COVID-19. The island has received its much anticipated AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine from India. More in this report. A regional security services aircraft touched down at the George F. L. Charles airport Monday morning, stocked with 25,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine produced in India. The Serum Institute of India, one of the world's largest vaccine producers, is produced in Covishield, developed by AstraZeneca PLC. St. Lucia is among 49 countries in the Caribbean, Latin America, Asia and Africa to receive mostly free of charge the AstraZeneca under the Government of India's Vaccine Friendship Program. The initiative assists poorer countries in gaining access to vaccines. India has distributed 22.9 million doses under the program. Madhu Aznani, who represented the Indian High Commission, says the Government of India is committed to using the country's high-tech biopharma infrastructure to serve and protect humanity. As a result, India has so far conducted over 215 million COVID deaths with an impressive recovery rate of 97.14 percent and fatality rate of only 1.4 percent. As is well known, India has been supplying affordable and low-cost generic drugs to millions of people across the globe and has come to know to be known as pharmacy of the world and producer of choice for vaccines. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that India can not only innovate but also rapidly distribute time-sensitive, crucial drugs to every part of the globe that needs it. Intune with its philosophy, the whole world is one family. Prime Minister Hon. Alan Shastain receiving the shipment expressed gratitude toward Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his continuous, tangible support for St. Lucia and the rest of Karakam. And this level of commitment and, more importantly, sincerity. He has certainly gained a very special place, I believe in the hearts and the minds of all of us in Karakam because his have not just been words but he has continuously supported his commitment with action. Whether it be from climate change, whether it be from negotiations at the World Bank and the IMF and at the G7, he has been a voice that we can count upon. This donation of vaccines will significantly strengthen the national COVID-19 vaccination campaign. The administering of vaccines in St. Lucia began on Wednesday, February 17, 2021 and after the past two weeks it has been focused on vaccinating those who are at the highest risk of being exposed to the virus, that is, healthcare workers in clinical settings, first responders, security service personnel and other frontline workers. All of these personnel are within phase 1A of the vaccination program and as such were given first priority for receiving the vaccine. This week the national COVID-19 vaccination campaign will continue with frontline workers and phase 1B will also commence. In phase 1B people who are 65 years and older, residents of elderly homes and people living with chronic health conditions will be vaccinated. As such phases 1A and 1B will be taking place at the same time. Like Dominique and Barbados, St Lucia is sharing its doses with Grenada which was not included in this current batch of donated vaccines from India. Antigua gave 5,000 of their allocation, St Kitsunevis gave 2,000, St Vincent gave 5,000 and St Lucia has given 5,000. So of the 25,000 that we've received today, 5,000 of them will be set aside and will be delivered to Grenada tomorrow. And that is to say that there are more vaccines on the way. In the coming weeks, vaccination will be extended to the thousands of Senussians who have registered for the COVID-19 vaccine. Announcements of this shall be made by the Ministry of Health of the schedule of these other phases in preparation for commencement. From the Government Information Service, Lyssa Joseph reporting.