TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) -A Mexican health official on Tuesday said the government has not agreed to donate COVID-19 vaccines to Honduras and had only received a request for aid, after the Honduran president thanked Mexico for offering the Central American country 100,000 doses.
“I want to thank the people and government of Mexico because last night they confirmed the donation of 100,000 vaccine doses that will be reaching the country soon,” Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez said on Twitter.
He also thanked El Salvador and Israel for helping the country secure vaccines.
Mexico’s deputy health minister Hugo Lopez-Gatell said the request from Honduras, and other countries, were directed to the Foreign Ministry.
“Some governments of other countries that have had a well-known difficulty in accessing vaccines have made requests to Mexico through diplomatic channels,” he told a nightly news conference.
Referring to Hernandez’s comments, he said, “That has not happened. This is just the request that is being received.”
(Reporting by Gustavo Palencia and Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by Michael Perry)
