Japan will buy 10,500 deep freezers to store novel coronavirus vaccines and is considering purchasing dry ice in bulk as it prepares to protect its population from the virus.
The country has agreements to buy a total of 290 million doses of the vaccines from Pfizer Inc, AstraZeneca Plc and Moderna Inc, or enough for 145 million people if everyone gets two shots as required.
Pfizer's vaccines need to be kept at around minus 75 Celsius (and Moderna's at about minus 20C), posing logistics problems.
Pfizer, as well as Moderna and its domestic partner Takeda Pharmaceutical, plan to build networks to keep vaccines at the appropriate temperature as they are distributed to where they will be deployed, the ministry said in a statement.
Japan has had more than 165,000 cases of novel coronavirus infections and 2,417 fatalities, with the capital, Tokyo, particularly hard hit. Tokyo reported 352 new cases on Tuesday.
The death toll from a Russian airstrike on Chernihiv in northern Ukraine has risen to 18, officials said on Thursday, while another 78 were wounded when three missiles slammed into the city centre.
A man-made famine is "tightening its grip" across the Gaza Strip, the head of the United Nations Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA warned on Wednesday as he accused Israel of blocking aid deliveries and seeking to end UNRWA's activities in the enclave.
Indonesia shut a provincial airport and evacuated hundreds of people from the vicinity of the Ruang volcano after it belched explosive plumes of lava, rocks and ash for days, officials said on Thursday, declaring the highest alert on the situation.
The US House of Representatives will have its long-awaited vote on aid for Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific as soon as Saturday, Republican Speaker Mike Johnson said on Wednesday, paving the way for its possible passage despite fierce objections from the right wing of his conference.
Georgia's parliament on Wednesday approved the first reading of a bill on "foreign agents" that the European Union said risked stifling freedoms and blocking the country's path to membership.