Three vaccines for Romanians

Romania now has three types of Covid-19 vaccines and hopes to speed up the vaccination process

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Eugen Coroianu, 08.02.2021, 13:50

Romanians can now count on three Covid-19 vaccines, after the first tranche from AstraZeneca / Oxford arrived in the country on Sunday: 81 thousand doses for the regional storage centers in Cluj, Craiova, Iaşi and Timişoara. The distribution is made with special vehicles of the Ministry of National Defense, in optimal safety conditions, respecting the necessary cold chain. Following the recommendations of Romanian specialists and taking into account the manufacturer’s specifications and studies available so far, the AstraZeneca vaccine has been recommended in Romania for the 18-55 age group, with the possibility of increasing this range, depending on the appearance of new scientific data.

The recommended time interval between the administration of the two jabs is 8 weeks. Romania should receive at least 600,000 doses of this type of vaccine in February, and appointments for its administration will begin on February 10. To date, the vaccine produced by Pfizer / BioNTech has been administered predominantly, but a relatively small number of Moderna vaccines has also been used. Both have no upper age limit for use and have shown higher efficacy than AstraZeneca. The proportions were dictated by the availability of the two sera and follow the graphs recorded at the level of the European Union, which contracted the vaccines in advance on behalf of the Member States.

Therefore, Romania currently has all three types of vaccine approved for use in the community and is even one of the leading countries in the process of immunizing the population. The coordinator of the national vaccination campaign, doctor Valeriu Gheorghiţă, underlined that he wants to see all 750 vaccination centers rendered operational from April, which will ensure a rate of over one hundred thousand immunizations per day. Not all of them are currently open because there is no certainty about the delivery schedule. Valeriu Gheorghiţă pointed out that, based on what is confirmed for the first quarter of this year, including March, the vaccination calendar is full. He also said that from March 15, a new programming mode should be operationalized, which involves a waiting list from which the system will automatically notify those registered, depending on their options regarding vaccination centers and medical indications.

Between the three vaccines that Romania now has, there are differences in production technology, administration, storage and use and, also in terms of efficiency. But experts recommend any of them, saying that all can prevent serious and lethal forms of Covid 19. The Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, used so far in Romania, have generated, according to the Ministry of Health, only mild side effects in 0. 28% of the patients. (MI)