Pedro Sánchez, for whom the goal is vaccination of 70% of the population by the summer. | Zipi

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Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said on Friday that there will "soon" be more people vaccinated against coronavirus in Spain than people who are infected.

Speaking during a presentation of the economic recovery, transformation and resilience plan, Sánchez stated that Spain and Germany were the first European countries to approve state vaccination plans. In Spain, a total of 2,782,751 doses have been administered in less than two months, while 1,144,556 people have received two doses. In terms of the number of doses administered, the prime minister added, these figures place Spain among the top ten countries in the world and fourth in the European Union.

"We will soon have more people vaccinated than infected. This will be a very important milestone in overcoming the pandemic. In fact, the Canary Islands have already achieved this, and the rest of Spain is on the point of reaching it."

Sánchez noted that the European Medicines Agency will shortly be approving the Janssen vaccine. This will give a "decisive and definitive boost" to the vaccination programme and will help in achieving the goal of having 70% of the population vaccinated by the summer.

"In a progressive and orderly manner, we are going to attain herd immunity and end this nightmare. This will be done by protecting the weakest until mass vaccination is carried out and by guaranteeing equitable access to the vaccine at all times."

The prime minister stressed that there can be no lowering of the guard and that measures which have been adopted to stop the transmission of the virus must continue. "We cannot go backwards. We must go on until the spread of the virus is controlled."