USAID continues to support Ukraine’s fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. Today, USAID is announcing it has provided the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) new funding for the procurement and delivery of 14 ultra-low temperature freezers to Ukraine. With this delivery, taking place this week, Ukraine’s health authorities can simultaneously store up to 3 million doses of Pfizer vaccines, meeting an urgent need for additional vaccination capacity as the Omicron variant of COVID-19 arrives in Ukraine. The national storage facility at the state enterprise UkrMedPostach of the Ministry of Health in Kyiv will receive 10 freezers. The remaining four will be delivered to Kharkiv, Dnipro, Lviv and Odesa for vaccine storage at the regional level.

The delivery follows the United States’ donation earlier in December of an additional $1.2 million funding to WHO to meet immediate COVID response needs in Ukraine. The total USAID assistance to respond to and mitigate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic stands at over $50 million since the beginning of the COVID-19 in Ukraine.

“Today’s arrival of new U.S. Covid assistance to Ukraine demonstrates yet another way that the U.S. continues to stand behind Ukraine in the global fight against this pandemic, in partnership with the Ministry of Health, UNICEF and the WHO. These 14 new ultra cold chain freezers increase national capacity to safely store this lifesaving vaccine, and build on our support through UNICEF to supply more than 3,100 vaccine sites with cooling equipment,” said James Hope, USAID Ukraine Mission Director.