Behind the scenes of the vaccine operation: one injection every six minutes

Mega operation in progress in S. João to apply 2125 doses this Sunday. Vaccination also in Santo António, Coimbra and Lisbon North and Center.

“Everything is already here.” At the end of the day, two people were checking whether the 25 outpatient clinics of the São João Hospital, in Porto, have the necessary materials to vaccinate a health professional every six minutes this Sunday, until the 2125 doses that are used are used up. they gave him. adjustment. The timer is counting until 10 in the morning, when the first vaccine against covid-19 will be administered in Portugal.

Time is counted by the minute, especially since the expiration date for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine ends on Wednesday. After removing it from the refrigerator, pharmacists have two hours to dilute it and another six hours to administer it to each of the 2,125 assistants, diagnostic and therapeutic technicians, nurses and doctors who wanted to be vaccinated.

In the pharmacy, everything is ready to dilute the vaccine concentrate in physiological serum and transform the content of 425 vials into 2,125 doses. The process is carried out inside chambers, rectangular boxes in which only the necessary materials enter, says the director of the service, Pedro Soares.

For each bottle, five syringes, five needles, five bags are required. “It will be like a Russian ballet or a Swiss watch, whichever is more accurate,” he says. It is a form of control: if a syringe is missing or missing, it is because something went wrong.

Once diluted and syringed, the vaccines will be sealed in individual bags and transported to outpatient clinics in thermal boxes, not because it is now important to keep them cold (after dilution, they last six hours at room temperature). , but to protect them from possible shocks and vibrations. Every half hour, Pedro Soares estimates, a new section will travel, on the shoulders of a messenger, the five minutes that separate the pharmaceutical services from the vaccination posts. The second part of this type of assembly line will begin in the external consultation offices, vacated on Sundays.

Blitz vaccination

The first symbolic vaccine will be administered under the watchful eye of the Minister of Health. Even today, Marta Temido will also witness the start of the vaccination campaign in Santo António (Porto) and the Hospital Center of Coimbra and, on Monday, hospitals in the north of Lisbon (Santa Maria) and the center of Lisbon (Curry Cabral, Dona Estefânia and São José).

In the morning, in São João, the plan will accelerate right after the first, symbolic injection. In a period of eight hours, in the 25 offices, a team of 40 nurses takes turns inoculating 2,125 health professionals, at the rate of ten people per hour. If all goes according to plan, this “blitz” will manage to administer all the doses delivered to São João in 2020. And even then, not all those interested will receive the vaccine today. The hospital guarantees that the adherence rate was greater than 90%.

Guarded for two weeks

The selected health professionals, explained the director of the External Consultation Center, Xavier Barreto, were summoned for a specific time and will wait in the waiting room for the password system to indicate their turn. When their number comes in, they will have to enter the office, receive the injection and leave, all in six minutes.

Then, the next half hour will be spent in a kind of recovery room, where another team will monitor the appearance, or not, of adverse effects, such as allergies. “If there is a good place to have an adverse reaction, it is here,” says Nelson Pereira, director of Urgencies and Intensive Care. During the next two weeks, Occupational Health will continue to monitor the evolution of those vaccinated. There will also be a phone number that you can call in an emergency or ask questions. In total, the mega operation will involve a team of 100 people.

However, the first step will be taken today, early in the morning, when the pharmaceutical services begin to prepare the doses, hours before the nurses enter the 25 consultations, ready to wait.