Spain has postponed it’s decision on whether to give the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford university to those over the age of 65 who will only be given the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines.
The Public Health Commission agreed at Thursday's meeting that the first batch of AstraZeneca will be given to Healthcare and Social Healthcare Professionals who are not on the front line against coronavirus
Dr Fernando Simón, Director of the Centre for the Coordination of Health Alerts & Emergencies, or CCAES, said earlier this week that “it’s very possible" that AstraZeneca will only be given to younger people.
“According to the information that we have to date, clinical trials have not been carried out on people over 55 and since there is no evidence of side effects and efficacy in these groups, it’s very possible that it will only be recommended for younger people. In the absence of any information, I understand that it will be prudent,” he explained.
German vaccination experts have already said they may not vaccinate the over 65s with AstraZeneca.
"From what I have heard, although it is very preliminary, it is very possible that countries in the European Union will tend to follow Germany's recommendation," said Dr Simón.
First Doses
Spain will receive up to 1,810,575 doses of AstraZeneca this month and the first batch will arrive this weekend, which will be for Healthcare Personnel who work in Healthcare and Social Healthcare Centres, according to the Vaccination Strategy.
In February, Spain will receive around four million doses of the three Covid-19 vaccines authorised by the European Medicines Agency. That’s enough to vaccinate two million people, which is around 4% of the Spanish population.
There will be about 1,810,575 doses of AstraZeneca, 412,000 doses of Moderna and 1,779,579 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech, plus another batch of 2,750,040 in March.
With those and the Janssen company vaccine, the Health Department expects that there will be a "very significant" increase in doses available in Spain by March or April.
The Public Health Commission will meet again on Friday to continue discussing the way forward with the AstraZeneca vaccine.
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Jeremy you do know those wee bottles could be saline solution?
A poor attempt to lessen the reaction relating to the shambolic procurement of vaccines by the EU. Trying to imply that we wouldn't have used it anyway even if we'd managed to obtain enough supplies.
You need to kick the eu and order independently. The U.K. has done almost 500,000 TODAY !!! 2 million doses for a month is not enough.