Bulgaria’s Health Minister: It will be possible to vaccinate 50 000 to 100 000 people a day
The pace of the implementation of Bulgaria’s national plan for vaccination against Covid-19 no longer depends on organisation, but on the supply of vaccines to the country, Health Minister Kostadin Angelov said on January 25, according to a media statement by his ministry.
“The organisation we have created allows 50 000 to 100 000 people to be vaccinated in Bulgaria every day,” Angelov said.
General practitioners, medical institutions and mobile teams are included in the plan for implementation.
He said that the quantities of vaccines to be provided to Bulgaria, in accordance with the agreement with the European Commission, are completely sufficient for the vaccination of people in the country.
“All the vaccines we have received so far have been given, and the second doses are stored in the freezers of the responsible health inspectorates,” he said.
In dealing with the vaccinations, Bulgaria had acted extremely conservatively, but far-sightedly, he said.
“If it had not been so, today the conversation would be about irresponsible behaviour and lack of doses for 17 000 Bulgarian citizens,” Angelov said.
Earlier on January 25, at a meeting with Prime Minister Boiko Borissov and other officials, Angelov said that so far more than 26 000 people in Bulgaria had been immunised, and 4610 people had been given the second dose of the vaccine.
Vaccination of teachers will begin in some areas of the country. The lists of those wishing to be vaccinated in the third phase of the vaccination plan are also being prepared.
Borissov said: “Let people know that a maximum of three to four days after the arrival of the vaccine, half of the quantities are given, and the other half is kept for 21 days, for the second dose. With these shaky deliveries, we are not risking people’s health”.
Medicines Agency head Bogdan Kirilov told the meeting that more than 14 000 doses of vaccines had arrived in Bulgaria on January 25. From next week, deliveries will be on a weekly basis, he said.
Separately, a statement on the website of Plovdiv municipality said that less than 0.2 per cent of the antigen tests of staff of municipal schools in the city had proved positive.
This figure was based on the data of 78 per cent of the teaching staff and 33 per cent of non-teaching staff, according to Plovdiv municipality’s health department.
Those who had tested positive, who were from different schools in Plovdiv, had been quarantined.
“The results are very encouraging, because of all 2221 teachers tested, only four tested positive, which means that teachers are healthy and a normal learning process can begin after February 4,” said Donka Sthilyanova, head of the municipality’s education department.
Plovdiv is the first city in Bulgaria to have begun mass antigen tests of teachers at all 52 of its municipal schools. This week the project is continuing mainly among non-teaching staff, the municipality said.
(Photo of Angelov from his Facebook page)
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