Two weeks before the start of a new phase of vaccination against the coronavirus, More than 1,240 Neuquinos received their third booster or fifth dose. From the Ministry of Health of the province confirmed a LM Neuquen until this Thursday 1247 doses were applied to those who received the second booster or fourth dose more than 120 days ago. At the end of October, the Federal Council of Health (COFESA) it allowed the positioning of the third booster or the fifth dose throughout the national territory. Ailín Frades, vaccination coordinator of the Metropolitan Health Zone, stressed that the demand for this fifth dose is developing “quite slowly” in vaccination centers and health centers in the province.
He commented that the low demand for the vaccine is linked “to the fact that the perception of the risk of the disease has also decreased” by the population of the province, as is the case in the rest of the country.
In the province, the application of the third booster of the coronavirus vaccine began on November 2.
This new phase in the application of booster doses is intended for people over the age of 18 with or without risk factors and for immunocompromised people from the age of 12 who have already received their second booster more than 120 days ago.
Frades specified it “about 50,000 people” in the province are able to receive this third reinforcement out of a target population of 170,000 people. He added that priority will be given to those aged 50 or more and to those with risk conditions and then continue with the rest of the population.
On the other hand, he confirmed that there is availability of sufficient doses for this new phase of the coronavirus vaccination plan, which began in Neuquén on December 29, 2020 with the application of the first vaccines that arrived in the country.
The Metropolitan Health Zone Vaccination Coordinator commented that in the first days of vaccination of this new phase, “about 100 people a day” went to health centers to receive booster shots.
Meanwhile, he stressed that again there are people who go to health centers to start their vaccination program against COVID.
Finally, Frades stressed the importance of approaching vaccination centers and health centers to complete vaccination programs because “the protection is effective and safe as long as we have a complete program.”
“We must insist on the importance of reinforcements”
Almost two years after the start of the vaccination campaign against COVID-19, More than 599,000 people in the province of Neuquén have the complete vaccination program against this disease.. The vaccination campaign began on December 29, 2020, initially aimed at public and private sector health personnel who worked in the most compromised areas, such as intensive care, and laboratory operators.
According to the latest report released by the Ministry of Health on October 11, they are 599,365 Neuquén who have completed the program, representing 89% of the population.
While, 638,338 people were vaccinated with the first dosewhich represents a coverage of 95% of the population.
The health portfolio specified that 1,679,382 vaccines had been applied in the province, including first, second, booster and additional doses.
Ailín Frades, vaccination coordinator of the Metropolitan Health Zone, highlighted the current situation of normality in daily life, very different from that experienced some time ago in the context of a pandemic.
“Today we are able to function normally in our lives thanks to the vaccination campaign that has been carried out, with a high demand for the first and second dose, which is reflected in the coverage percentages that the province has,” he explained. However, she insisted on “continuing to vaccinate us and above all to do it with reinforcements”.
He argued that both the Covid vaccines and the flu vaccines or those scheduled in the official calendar were and are available in health centers “in this way they were able to comply with the vaccines scheduled in the national calendar”.
An open chapter: the consequences for those who have fallen ill
“The important thing, as with all vaccines, is to complete the schemes because the protection is effective and safe as long as we have a complete scheme”, said Araceli Gitlein, coordinator of the Neuquén Ministry of Health’s Immunization and Surveillance Program for Immunopreventable Diseases, when the new phase of the immunization campaign against COVID-19 was announced.
The specialist stressed that the placement of the third booster or the fifth dose was approved by the Federal Health Council (COFESA) “on the basis of scientific evidence and the experience seen in other countries”. He added that Argentina is “fine” from an epidemiological point of view.
Gitlein believed that given the situation in the country with COVID, vaccine boosters should be applied to isolate the virus. He said the COVID issue is “an open chapter”. “We didn’t have a history of this disease, it arrived and created havoc in our society and it is still an open chapter in the sense of how it will continue to behave and what the consequences will be for those who have fallen ill. So, there’s one tool that’s been very effective, which is the vaccine.”
