Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš received about 41,000 Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccines from Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto on Friday afternoon.
The vaccines were delivered directly to the O2 Universum Center in Prague, where up to 6,000 doses a day are currently being administered. By mid-June, that number should rise to 7,000 doses a day, Babiš said.
They agreed to redirect about 80,000 doses after the Czech Republic rejected a compromise regarding additional distribution of ten million doses within the EU.
Babiš noted that Hungary had previously donated 160 lung ventilators to the Czech Republic, as well as 200 hospital beds.
"When fighting along with (Austrian Chancellor) Sebastian Kurz within the framework of Europe for distribution of vaccines according to population size, the declared solidarity failed to manifest," Babiš said.
Szijjarto said Hungary had delivered the vaccines to the Czech Republic because the two countries were friends, their economies were interconnected, and their tourists like to visit each other's countries.
He also mentioned the agreement between Hungary and the Czech Republic (and other countries in Central Europe), under which residents can now travel without any limitations provided they are at least three weeks after their first vaccine dose. This must be proven by a national certificate.
On Monday, Czech military aircraft carried over 100,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine from Belgrade, which was donated to the Czech Republic by Serbia.
Since the start of the vaccination last December, roughly 5.66 million doses have been administered. Over 1.65 million Czechs have completed their vaccination.
The pace of the vaccination is speeding up. More than 100,000 doses per day have been administered six days in recent weeks. On Wednesday, a record 112,231 people were vaccinated.