ANKARA — Turkey granted emergency use authorization for Russia's Sputnik V vaccine on Friday, according to Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.

"Turkey's Medicines and Medical Devices Agency approved the emergency use of the Sputnik V vaccine after examination and evaluation," Koca wrote on his Twitter account. "With this, the Sputnik V vaccine becomes the third vaccine available for use in our country," he said.

On Thursday, the Turkish health minister said that 50 million doses of the Russian vaccine will start arriving next month to address a short-term fall in supply, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said on Wednesday.

Vaccines will be scarce in the upcoming two months, Koca said, but the shortfall should in time be overcome with the new procurements and ultimately by production in Turkey.

Turkey has so far relied primarily on China’s Biotech Sinovac with smaller batches of Pfizer/BioNTech for its vaccine campaign.

Turkey went into lockdown on Thursday for the remainder of the holy month of Ramadan and the following Eid Al-Fitr holiday.

The first national lockdown, which began on Thursday at 7 p.m. local time, will end at 5 a.m. local time on May 17, according to a statement from the country’s interior ministry. — Agencies