Rwanda has started immunising its health care workers against Covid-19, the health ministry said on Sunday.

An official in the ministry told the BBC that immunisation with the Pfizer vaccine started last week in a few hospitals in the capital, Kigali.

In a tweet, the ministry said the vaccines were acquired “through international partnerships in limited quantities”.

Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Mauritius, Morocco and Seychelles are the other African countries that have started vaccination.

Officials in Rwanda said there will be a wider roll-out this month with supplies expected from the Covax initiative and African Union.

Rwanda has so far confirmed 17,000 coronavirus cases with 239 deaths.