The Dubai-based airline Emirates launched a coronavirus vaccination program for its employees in the United Arab Emirates on Monday to bolster the tourism sector.

“The vaccination campaign began this morning, with priority given to the frontline staff including cabin crew, flight deck and other operational roles,” a statement said in a statement.

It has provided the Pfizer-BioNTech and China’s Sinopharm puffs.

The staff vaccination operations are conducted 12 hours a day, seven days a week “to ensure that as many key aviation workers as possible can get the vaccine,” the airline said.

The capital of the United Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi, began vaccinating in mid-December after Sinopharm was approved, while Dubai began the prick developed by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech later that month.

The UAE has registered more than 253,000 Covid-19 cases so far, including 745 deaths.

According to health authorities, it has already vaccinated over 1.8 million of its roughly 10 million residents.

With much of the world tightening lockdowns to curb the spread of the virus, Dubai reopened its doors to tourism last July.

Abu Dhabi, which is less dependent on tourism with large oil reserves, has taken a more conservative approach and generally requires quarantine on arrival.

With a negative PCR test in their home countries – and possibly a different one on arrival, depending on the place of departure – tourists can freely enter Dubai, where winter temperatures average 25 degrees Celsius (77 Fahrenheit).

Tourism has long been a pillar of Dubai’s economy, welcoming more than 16 million visitors in 2019 before the pandemic.

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