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ARCHIVED - First Covid vaccines expected to roll-out in January across Spain
The European Medicines Agency is pulling out all the stops to get the first vaccines authorised before the end of December
Hopes are high that immunization can begin soon after Three Kings in Spain
The chink of light at the end of the tunnel appears to be getting larger and brighter as 2020 nears its end and testing and authorization procedures are accelerated for the coronavirus vaccines which have been developed since the start of the pandemic, and in Spain the Ministry of Health is hoping for the best Three Kings present possible in early January with the arrival if the first doses in this country.
That vaccines are on the point of becoming available under a year after Sars-Cov-2 was first detected in Europe is due not only to the extraordinary efforts of pharmaceutical researchers throughout the world but also to the efforts to speed up the authorization procedures required for new medications in the EU, and these are to be further accelerated in order to make immunization possible in January even if it means the scientific committee sacrificing their Christmas holidays, according to the European Commission.
So confident is the EC that this can be made feasible and that no last-minute hitches are encountered that they are stating that vaccine doses will start to become available during January. This has been made possible by the decision to cut the 67-day period usually required after approval of new drugs is given by the European Medicines Agency to just 3 days before permission will be given for distribution and sale to begin.
As a result, all being well, authorization for the Pfizer vaccine could be in place on 29th December, and distribution could begin in the first week of January.
The three days will include consultations with all EU member states, and assuming that authorization is granted it will then be seen whether those states have taken on board the advice which was first issued during the summer, namely to ensure that they are fully prepared to administer the immunization campaign. Some countries, unfortunately, are believed not to have equipped themselves yet with the necessary scientific and administrative infrastructures, which include the ability to store the Pfizer vaccine at -78ºC (although the company says it will supply ultra-freezers where needed) and the establishment of vaccination stations.
In Spain it has been announced that vaccines will be administered at 13,000 medical centres throughout the country.
At the same time the EC is keen to dispel doubts about the possible side-effects of a vaccine which has been developed so rapidly, guaranteeing that the development and testing of the new pharmaceutical products has been monitored minutely and that the vaccination process will be scrutinized in similar detail.
It is also worth adding that one of the reasons for the EMA not having given its authorization to the Pfizer vaccine earlier is that all of the scientific information generated during the process has to be translated into all of the official languages of the member states so that it can be consulted by their technical committees. In normal circumstances, each committee then has 22 days in which to submit its opinion on the matter, but in this case that time period has been reduced to just a single day.
UK and Hungary jump the gun by sidestepping EU approval
Meanwhile, two European countries have already given authorization for vaccination to begin before January: the UK, which has announced that the first doses of the Pfizer vaccine will be administered next week, and Hungary, which has acquired a batch of the Russian “Sputnik” vaccine. The producers of Sputnik have not yet applied for permission to market their product in the EU, hence its absence from the list of purchases made by the Union.
50,000 people in Murcia could be vaccinated in January
But in the Region of Murcia it now seems safe to say that the wait will not be much longer than in the UK and Hungary, and early in 2021 the first 50,000 or so people in high risk categories will be able to receive their first dose. These will be residents and staff in homes for the elderly, other elderly people and those with chronic medical conditions or other respiratory conditions, who will receive their second dose three weeks after the first jab.
All patients will receive notification of their vaccination appointment from their local medical centre when their turn comes, according to Manuel Villegas, the minister for Health in the regional government. At the same time, however, Sr Villegas has reiterated that the exact number of doses to be distributed to each of the 17 regions of Spain in the initial phase of immunization has yet to be finalized.
Pfizer encounter production problems
With optimism running high as the year approaches its end, however, there is one cloud on the horizon: Pfizer has abruptly halved its vaccine production target for the remainder of December due to problems with the supply chain of some of the components, according to a statement issued on Thursday.
This means that this month, rather than producing 100 million doses of the drug which has already been approved for use in the UK, the company will be distributing “only” 50 million before the end of the year.
However, it is reported that the problems with supplies have now been solved and the projected target of 1,000 million doses in 2021 remains in place.
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