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Hungary and Slovakia were ahead of their fellow European Union countries when they began vaccinating their people against the coronavirus on Saturday.
The countries’ move comes a day before deployments in several other countries, including France, Germany and Spain, as the pandemic spreads across the continent.
Mass vaccination across the European Union would be a crucial step in ending a pandemic that has killed more than 1.7 million people worldwide, crippled economies, and destroyed businesses and jobs. The EU is home to almost 450 million people.
The arrival of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines at a hospital in Nitra, Slovakia on Saturday. Slovakia started vaccinating tonight. Photograph: EPA
Hungary administered the vaccine, developed by Pfizer and BioNTech, to front-line workers at hospitals in the capital Budapest after receiving its first shipment of doses sufficient to inoculate 4,875 people.
The first worker to receive the vaccine was a doctor from the Del-Pest Central Hospital. Hungary has reported 315,362 cases with 8,951 deaths. More than 6,000 people remain hospitalized for the disease, putting the central European country’s care system to the test.
In Slovakia, Vladimir Krcmery, an infectologist and member of the government commission against the pandemic, was the first person to receive the vaccine, followed by his colleagues.
The launch in Hungary and Slovakia came a day before countries such as France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Portugal and Spain began mass vaccinations, starting with healthcare workers.
Distribution of the Pfizer-BioNTech injection, which was first launched in Britain earlier this month, presents tough challenges. The vaccine uses a new genetic mRNA technology, which means that it must be stored at ultra-low temperatures of about -80 degrees.
The vaccine arrives in Ireland
The first shipment of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has arrived in Ireland.
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said the country would begin its vaccination program next Wednesday, with front-line healthcare workers and nursing home residents in the front row to receive the vaccine.
“After a difficult and different Christmas for many people, it is wonderful to see the first deliveries of Covid-19 vaccines in Ireland today,” said Donnelly. “The arrival of these vaccines. . . It is a significant and positive event ”, he added.
He said the recent surge in cases had focused “our collective minds on the ongoing challenge of Covid-19” and said the advent of “safe and effective vaccines will help us protect the most vulnerable in our society as we intensify our program. immunization “. ”.
Saturday marks the second day in a row that the number of daily infections surpassed the 1,000 mark. Before this week, the daily figure had not exceeded 1,000 since October 25. There have been 2,200 deaths as a result of the pandemic and 85,394 confirmed cases of the disease in the Republic.
New variant in France, Spain
France, which received its first shipment of the two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine on Saturday, will begin administering it in the Paris metropolitan area and the Burgundy-Franche-Comté region on Sunday.
“We have 19,500 doses in total, which is equivalent to 3,900 vials. These doses will be stored in our -80 degree freezer and then distributed to different nursing homes and hospitals, ”said Franck Huet, head of pharmaceuticals for the Paris public hospital system.
The French government hopes to vaccinate roughly one million people in nursing homes during January and February, and then another 14-15 million in the general population between March and June.
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was approved by the French medical regulator on Thursday.
France reported only 3,093 new coronavirus infections in the last 24 hours on Saturday, well below the more than 20,000 cases in each of the previous two days, figures not seen since Nov.20. But the seven-day moving average of daily new cases, which evens out irregularities in the reports, is at a high of about a month.
The first batch of Covid-19 vaccines arrives in Tenerife, Spain. Photograph: EPA
The number of confirmed virus cases in France now stands at 2,550,864, the fifth highest count in the world, while its death toll stands at 62,573, the seventh highest.
In a concerning development, the Health Ministry said on Friday that a man who recently arrived from London had tested positive for a new variant of the virus that has been spreading rapidly in southern England and is believed to be more infectious.
And Spain?
In Spain, Madrid health authorities said on Saturday that they had confirmed four cases of the new variant of the virus, as the country received its first deliveries of the vaccine.
The boxes arrived by truck at a storage facility near Madrid at dawn. Employees at Spain’s drug agency unpacked the vaccine, which is stored on dry ice, with gloved hands.
“The vaccination will begin tomorrow in Spain, coordinated with the rest of Europe,” said the Minister of Health, Salvador Illa. “This is the beginning of the end of the pandemic.”
Italian police drive a truck carrying the first batch of Covid-19 vaccines arriving at the Spallanzani Hospital in Rome, Italy. Photograph: EPA
The doses will be carried by air to the Spanish islands and the North African enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla. They will also be transported by road to other regions where some 50,000 people have died from the disease.
Logistics in Germany
Germany, meanwhile, said trucks were on their way to deliver the vaccine to nursing homes, which are the first to receive the vaccine on Sunday.
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases nationwide jumped from 14,455 to 1,627,103, data from the Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases showed Saturday. More than 29,000 people have died, in all.
The federal government plans to distribute more than 1.3 million doses of vaccines to local health authorities by the end of this year and about 700,000 a week starting in January.
“There may be some setbacks at one point or another at the beginning, but that is quite normal when such a logistically complex process begins,” said Health Minister Jensen Spahn.
And in portugal
A truck escorted by the police left the first batch of vaccines in a warehouse in the central region of the country. From there, the nearly 10,000 vaccines will be delivered to five large hospitals.
“It is a historic milestone for all of us, an important day after such a difficult year,” said Health Minister Marta Temido outside the warehouse.
“Now a window of hope has opened, without forgetting that there is a very difficult fight ahead.” – Reuters
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