The vaccination campaign against Covid-19 in the European Union starts today in several Member States, including Portugal, less than a week after the approval of the first vaccine to be administered in European territory.
Approved on December 21 by the European Medical Agency (EMA) and the European Commission, the vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech began to be distributed at the same time in the 27 member states - a commitment from Brussels to ensure equal treatment for all - , although not all start to administer it today.
In Hungary, doctors and healthcare professionals began getting vaccinated on Saturday following the arrival of the first shipments of Covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer-BioNTech, with Slovakia indicating that it would also start the campaign on the same day. Also in the Saxony-Anhalt region, in northeastern Germany, vaccines began to be administered on Saturday.
The European Commission has pointed out, moreover, the start of the campaign in Europe for a period of three days, the so-called “EU Vaccination Days”, 27th, 28th and 29th December, and today will be the day when more Member States effectively. members will begin to administer the vaccine, even if symbolically, in the overwhelming majority of cases to health professionals or to the elderly, groups considered to be priority groups.
Portugal, Spain, Italy, France, Germany and Belgium are among the EU countries that are now starting to use the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which some time ago began to be administered in other countries around the world, including the United States and the United Kingdom United Kingdom, while several countries have moved towards the Sputnik V vaccine, developed by Russia. But other Member States will start vaccination in other days or even next year, like the Netherlands, for example, which will only start on January 08, 2021.
Brussels has acquired 200 million doses of the vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech, with Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides explaining in an interview with Lusa and other European media that the supply of batches to Member States will continue over the last days of the period. year, on a weekly basis at the beginning of next year, and will be intensified in the second quarter of 2021, and it is foreseeable that they have just been administered in September.
However, other Covid-19 vaccines should soon be available in the EU, as the European Commission has a portfolio of five other potential vaccines, developed by AstraZeneca, Sanofi-GSK, Johnson & Johnson, CureVac and Moderna, with the latter due to be the next to receive the 'green light' from the EMA, which scheduled its scientific opinion on 6 January.
Brussels has already warned that "it is not yet time to declare victory" over the pandemic, with the health commissioner stressing that "vaccines do not save lives, what saves lives is vaccination", so now follows the " great challenge' which represents 'an unprecedented mass vaccination campaign' across the EU and partner countries.
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