Pakistan's Sindh govt to stop salaries of employees who refuse COVID-19 vaccines

The order was passed during a meeting of the provincial task force on COVID-19 chaired by Chief Minister of Sindh province Murad Ali Shah.

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Islamabad: The chief minister of Pakistan's Sindh province on Thursday directed the authorities to stop the salaries of government officials from July if they fail to get vaccinated for COVID-19. The order was passed during a meeting of the provincial task force on COVID-19 chaired by Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah.

"Government employees who do not get themselves vaccinated will have their salaries stopped from July," Shah said.

A directive on this has been issued to the finance ministry, officials said.

The Sindh government has already fixed June 5 as the deadline for all teachers in the province to get vaccinated in order to reopen all educational institutions from June 7.

According to the the Sindh Health Department, 1,550,553 people have been vaccinated in the province so far, while 1,121,000 people have received the first dose and 429,000 people have been fully vaccinated against the virus.

Meanwhile, Pakistan's coronavirus tally reached 926,695 on Thursday with the detection of 2,028 cases in the last 24 hours, while 92 more fatalities pushed the death toll to 21,022, the health ministry said.

Sindh reported the highest number of 1,041 infections and 22 deaths, followed by Punjab (432 cases, 48 deaths), Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (326 cases, 18 deaths), Islamabad (89 cases), Balochistan (75 cases, 3 deaths), Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (57 cases, 1 death) and Gilgit-Baltistan (8 cases).