Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas. Photo: Kremlin.ru.

i24 News – Palestinian Authority (PA) officials announced on Saturday that they expect to receive four million doses of a coronavirus vaccine from Russia next month.

The first stage of the rollout will include 150,000 doses to vaccinate essential workers including medical staff, security services, and media personnel, according to Osama al-Najjar, an official with the PA Health Ministry.

The PA Health Ministry has recorded over 78,000 cases of COVID-19 and a death toll of at least 740.

Earlier in the week the PA imposed a new lockdown in several West Bank governorates and extended a curfew in the evenings and weekends throughout the territory to combat a surge in infections.

Four cities in the West Bank — Hebron, Nablus, Tulkarem, and Bethlehem — have been designated as “red zones” by the Palestinian Authority following a massive outbreak of the virus and are now subject to general lockdown restrictions.

The new measures are believed to impact the lives of more than 1.6 million Palestinians in the West Bank.