Mexico to use US vaccine gift mainly on border, at resorts

Mexican officials say the United States will give Mexico a million doses of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine that will be used mainly along the border and at resorts frequented by Americans

MEXICO CITY -- Mexican officials said Thursday the United States is donating a million doses of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine that will be used mainly along the border and at resorts frequented by Americans. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador wrote in his social media accounts that U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris told him the United States would send the vaccines, but did not specify when. Mexico’s point man on the pandemic said Mexico would set a priority for using the vaccine in Caribbean resorts like Cancún, Pacific coast resorts like Los Cabos and cities along the U.S. border. Assistant Health Secretary Hugo López-Gatell did not say whether that was a condition of the U.S. vaccine shipment. Instead, he depicted it as an economic move, aimed at avoiding potential partial shutdowns in areas where the economy is based on tourism or cross-border manufacturing facilities known as maquiladoras.