The millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine that the Netherlands has ordered will soon no longer be used. Jaap van Delden, RIVM’s vaccination coordinator, expects this. In a conversation with the AD he says the millions of doses of the drug delivered after mid-May will most likely no longer need to be used.
Van Delden expects that sufficient doses of other vaccines will be available by then. AstraZeneca is only given to people between the ages of 60 and 64 because of a very rare but serious side effect of thrombosis. Once they have received their second vaccination, the British-Swedish vaccine will probably be unnecessary.
The Netherlands has ordered about 11.7 million doses of AstraZeneca, more than the other vaccines. But the vast majority of them – some 10 million doses – are not expected to be delivered until the third and fourth quarters of this year.
By then, the Health Ministry believes it will have received millions of doses of the other vaccines as well. According to the vaccination schedule, Dutch people born after 1960 are only injected with BioNTech / Pfizer, Moderna or Janssen.
Purchased more with a view to failure
A large part of the AstraZeneca vaccines ordered will therefore probably remain on the shelf. The remaining vaccines are partly stored and partly distributed to less prosperous countries, Van Delden thinks. This could be done through the Covax program of, among others, the WHO health organization.
Incidentally, it is not immediately said that there will be a million doses left; at AstraZeneca, delivery has so far been particularly uncertain.
–
