A girl receives a dose of COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination point in Jingning She Autonomous County in Lishui, east China's Zhejiang Province, Aug. 12, 2021.Photo:Xinhua

More than 777 million Chinese - more than half of the Chinese population - have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, the National Health Commission (NHC) reported in its latest progress update released on Friday. 

A total of 1.83 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administrated in the Chinese mainland, Mi Feng, spokesperson of NHC, said at a press briefing Friday afternoon.  

Although the total number of domestic-transmitted COVID-19 cases has been on the rise for 19 consecutive days, involving 16 provinces and 156 medium-to-high risk areas, the commission official said that the risk of a large-scale domestic outbreak remains remote, and the overall situation is well under control. .

Over 1,282 domestically transmitted cases have been reported in 48 cities in 18 provinces as of Thursday in the latest wave of outbreak… zero cases have been reported for over five days in 36 cities, said He Qinghua, a senior NHC official. 

He noted that more than 60 million COVID-19 vaccine doses had been administrated to young people aged 12 to 17. 

In some hard-hit foreign countries, the incidence and prevalence of COVID-19 among children is increasing... vaccination of children is also an integral part of building herd immunity, said Wang Huaqing, an immunologist with the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Global Times