by Paulina Duran
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia has abandoned its goal of vaccinating nearly all of its 26 million people against the coronavirus by the end of the year following its decision to recommend that people under the age of 50-year-olds receive Pfizer’s vaccine rather than AstraZeneca’s.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Australia is no longer setting a target to complete its COVID-19 vaccination campaign, as the country plans to use majority doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine.
“Although we would like to see these doses delivered before the end of the year, it is not possible to set such targets due to the many uncertainties present,” he said in a message posted on Sunday evening on Facebook.
Health officials on Thursday changed their guideline for people under the age of 50, recommending the Pfizer vaccine, after European regulators highlighted the possibility of links between the AstraZeneca vaccine and cases of atypical blood clots.
Canberra previously aimed to vaccinate the entire Australian population by the end of October. The vaccination campaign began at the end of February, much later than in other countries, in particular due to the low number of contaminations – less than 29,400 cases, including 909 deaths, since the start of the health crisis.
Scott Morrison reported that around 1.16 million doses of the vaccine have been administered so far, noting that the pace of the vaccination campaign was similar to other countries including France and Germany and ahead on others, such as Canada and Japan.
While the strict containment measures adopted in the face of the epidemic have made it possible to avoid local sources of contamination, the deployment of vaccines has become a source of tension between the leaders of the Australian states and territories and Scott Morrison. Four million doses were initially due to be administered before the end of March.
(Paulina Duran; French version Jean Terzian)
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