Palau could become one of the first countries to be vaccinated against the coronavirus

The tiny COVID-free Pacific nation of Palau is poised to become one of the world’s first countries to be mostly vaccinated against the coronavirus.

With a population nudging just above 21,600, the country is about the same size of some suburbs in Sydney and Melbourne.

It’s this size that has put the country in prime position to be among the first to be inoculated against COVID-19, after it received its first shipment of the Moderna vaccine on Saturday and commenced vaccinations on Sunday.

“Palau is a very small island with a very small population, and that’s an advantage,” Colin Tukuitonga, a specialist in public health in the Pacific at the University of Auckland, told the ABC.