Catalonia will receive 30,000 vaccines from Pfizer, half the expected

Santa Coloma de GramenetThis Monday Catalonia will only receive about 30,000 vaccines from Pfizer/BioNTech, half the doses to which the pharmacist and the Health Ministry committed themselves for each week. Specifically, 28,400 will arrive. The Health Department already expected the new shipment of vaccines to be significantly smaller than the previous two, which were 60,000 each, as the company announced on Friday that it would limit deliveries in Europe to make improvements in production capacity. Hours after Pfizer's announcement, at dusk, the Spanish government also warned that Spain would only receive 56% of the expected doses (67% if you count that you can get six doses out of each vial) and that this decision, which was not made by the executive, would reduce the forecasts and shipments of the regional executives.

"We do not have the guarantee that next week we will receive the 60,000 doses planned, but we have reasons to believe we will because we have been told that it is a specific problem for this week", admitted Catalan Minister of Health, Alba Vergés, who defended that Catalonia "is ready to vaccinate" within the European vaccination strategy. However, she has asked the Spanish government to do "all that it has to do" to be able to vaccinate "more and faster" following the European strategy, and has justified that if no more vaccines are administered it is because no more doses are coming."We are prepared to administer as many as necessary," she said.

As a general rule, Pfizer sends 350,000 vaccinations a week to the Health Department. Catalonia always receives the second largest shipment in Spain, with 60,000 weekly doses, only behind Andalusia, which receives 70,000. As Spain has only received 205,727 vaccines, 40% less, Catalonia will receive half as many. In addition, the Spanish executive will prioritise this week the communities that have given the most vaccines between December 27 and January 3 to ensure that the second dose is given within the recommended 21-day period between the two injections.

Sources from the Ministry of Health affirm that, with the continuity stock and the new shipment, the second dose to care homes will be assured, especially in the first centers where the vaccine was given. "We will prioritise doses for the second vaccinations in order not to break the chain," said Vergés. So far, according to public data, a total of 145 elderly people have been vaccinated with the second dose, most of them in the Alt Pirineu and Aran health region.

The first person vaccinated against covid in Catalonia, Josefa Perez, 89, has also received the second dose. On Monday, a team of nurses went to the Feixa Llarga care home in l'Hospitalet de Llobregat, where she lives, to vaccinate her 21 days after injecting her with the first dose, the minimum time that has to pass between vaccinations. The director of this centre, Conxita Barbeta, also received the second dose. In two weeks time, the people who received the second dose today Monday should be completely protected from the covid and, therefore, should not become ill if exposed to the virus