Al Zeyoudi and Khalaf narrowly miss out on medals as UAE end Paralympic campaign

Maryam Al Zeyoudi and Mohammed Khamis Khalaf both narrowly missed out on medals for the UAE at the Paris Paralympic Games on Saturday.

Al Zeyoudi, one of the UAE's flag-bearers in the opening ceremony on August 28 alongside cyclist Ahmed Al Badwawi, just missed out on a place on the podium as she finished fourth in the women’s F40 shot put final at the Stade de France on Saturday.

She threw an area best 8.62m throw to finish behind Lara Baars of the Netherlands, who took gold with a Paralympic record 9.10m effort. Poland's Renata Sliwinska took silver with a season's best 9.00m, while Tunisia's Raja Jebali won bronze after equalling her season's best with a throw of 8.66m. Oman's Sara Al Anburi finished in 11th place with a season's best of 4.48m.

Al Zeyoudi’s effort was as close as the Emirati Paralympic team came to winning a medal after their star shooter Abdullah Sultan Al Aryani finished sixth in the 50m Rifle 3 positions.

Earlier, Al Zeyoudi had finished 12th in the F40 discus throw finals. It was her second Paralympics after 2020 Tokyo.

The 26-year-old had previously won shot put gold in the World Championships in 2024 Kobe and a gold and silver in the discus and shot put at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou. Her two efforts at Paris stand as her best results in the Paralympics.

Later in the day, Khalaf also finished fourth in the powerlifting 80-kilogram final with a best lift of 210kg.

Panpan Yan of China took gold with a Paralympic record lift of 242kg. Mohamed El Elfat (224kg) of Egypt and Ukrainian Yurii Babynets (214kg) took home the silver and bronze respectively.

Khalaf, 55, was on his sixth appearance in the Paralympic Games, being the first Emirati Paralympian to win gold, at 2004 Athens. He followed that up with silver in 2008 Beijing and clinched a second gold at 2016 Rio.

Maryam Al Dhanhani went down to Khatira Ismiyeva of Azerbaijan in the women’s judo 70-kilogram J1 in the round of 16.

Khatira won by Ippon after 18 seconds at the Champ de Mars Arena. Al Dhanhani had scored a Waza-ari after eight seconds.

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Sinopharm vaccine explained

The Sinopharm vaccine was created using techniques that have been around for decades.

“This is an inactivated vaccine. Simply what it means is that the virus is taken, cultured and inactivated," said Dr Nawal Al Kaabi, chair of the UAE's National Covid-19 Clinical Management Committee.

"What is left is a skeleton of the virus so it looks like a virus, but it is not live."

This is then injected into the body.

"The body will recognise it and form antibodies but because it is inactive, we will need more than one dose. The body will not develop immunity with one dose," she said.

"You have to be exposed more than one time to what we call the antigen."

The vaccine should offer protection for at least months, but no one knows how long beyond that.

Dr Al Kaabi said early vaccine volunteers in China were given shots last spring and still have antibodies today.

“Since it is inactivated, it will not last forever," she said.