Egypt’s Doctors Syndicate has urged on Monday the health ministry to accelerate COVID-19 vaccination of medical staff without delay amid a rise in infections and deaths among front liners in the past period.

In a letter to the ministry, the Doctors Syndicate asked that the ministry speed the pace of the immunisation program for doctors as soon as possible after the virus killed 50 doctors in the last two weeks.

The syndicate expressed its readiness to help in providing the vaccine for doctors, including setting vaccination centres in various sites or helping in the registration of doctors.

Egypt has been witnessing a rise in fatalities and infections among doctors in the past period amid a spike in daily reported cases nationwide.

The death toll of doctors since the outbreak last year currently stands at 464.

Egypt began vaccinating priority groups in March under a wider rollout of the vaccination program after it began the vaccination of the country’s medical staff in January.

The government is seeking to secure vaccines for the overpopulous nation as it continues to expand its immunisation program.

Currently, the available vaccines are the Chinese Sinopharm and the British-Swedish Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, both of which were granted emergency use authorisation by authorities earlier this year.

The country has so far received over 1.5 million doses of the jabs, with more deliveries expected in the coming months.

Around 1.1 million citizens from all categories have registered online to receive the vaccine, with the number of those vaccinated estimated at over 320,000 since the launch of the immunisation program, according to health ministry officials earlier this month.