Vaccination must for transport, gym workers in Saudi Arabia

COVID-19 vaccines will be mandatory for all public transport workers in Saudi Arabia after May 13, the Transport General Authority said on Tuesday.

Workers will be required to be vaccinated in order to protect public health and curb the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19). In the event of noncompliance, the authority added, a negative PCR test result would be required every seven days at the facility’s expense.

The Ministry of Sports also issued similar directives to all gyms and sports centers in the Kingdom.

Saudi Arabia recorded 410 new coronavirus cases on Tuesday, raising the total number of infections to 385,834.

There are 4,051 active cases and the number of critical care patients is rising. There are 617 patients in intensive care units, an increase of 22 in the past 24 hours.

Riyadh reported the highest number of new cases with 159, the Eastern Province had 80 cases and Makkah had 71. Baha reported one case.

There were 366 further recoveries, taking the total number to 375,165, and there were five more deaths. Saudi Arabia’s death toll is now 6,618.

The Ministry of Health has reassured people that neither the Pfizer-BioNTech nor the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine contains parts of the inactivated virus.

Saudi Arabia has administered more than 3.5 million COVID-19 vaccine doses so far and there have been 53,823 PCR tests conducted in the past 24 hours, raising the total number of tests in the Kingdom to over 14.7 million.

Also on Tuesday, the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Dawah and Guidance temporarily closed 11 mosques in four regions after coronavirus cases were confirmed among worshippers.

It has closed 347 mosques within 44 days, 332 of which reopened after the completion of sanitization procedures and other steps to ensure visitor safety.