It all started with a tweet. Leszek Miller, former Polish prime minister, posted his coronavirus vaccination certificate on social media. Odd, given that the first phase of the national vaccination plan gave priority to health personnel. It would soon emerge that her case was one of more than 18 personalities, including movie stars and singers, who managed to skip the shift to be vaccinated in Poland.
The scandal, yet to be clarified, has clouded the deployment of the vaccination campaign, which officially began with Alicja Jakubowska, the head nurse of the Warsaw Central Hospital. Like her, health and nursing home personnel form the ‘zero group’, with priority to receive the vaccine before anyone else, obviously including politicians or celebrities. What happened in the clinic associated with the Warsaw Medical University so that, among others, the actresses Maria Seweryn and Kristyna Janda were vaccinated before, for example, the 10,000 health workers of the Faculty of Medicine itself?
According to the Health Minister, “the rules were deliberately broken.” The rector of the University, who at first said he did not know the facts, appears in a photograph greeting one of the famous right after the puncture. For now, the head of the clinic has been fired and the center has been fined 55,000 euros. According to the clinic’s explanations to the press, the problem was the lack of time to properly schedule the administration of the first batch of vaccines. Everything was planned during the Christmas holidays – the vaccinations began on December 27 – and, when the parents of celebrities and politicians attended the clinic accompanied by them, they were offered the possibility of being vaccinated “to take advantage of the already opened vials and the doses that were not used ”.
Miguel Á. Gayo Macías. Krakow
–
The excuse has not convinced anyone, and more considering that they tried to hide the facts. While the Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, was scandalized by what happened, the actress Kristyna Janda confessed on Facebook that she had also been vaccinated, and attached the link to a government document advising prioritize a select group of personalities “From the world of culture” to “promote the idea of vaccination.” However, in the group of vaccinated there were also politicians and a television executive.
In Poland, the country with the population that most distrusts the vaccine in Europe, and where the president himself, Andrzej Duda, said he did not believe in mandatory vaccination, this scandal is especially serious. For many, instead of encouraging people to overcome their prejudices and get vaccinated, what has been achieved is to confirm the old idea that elite and connected groups will always have advantages. A humorous cartoon in the press read: “It turns out that vaccines do not cause autism, but nepotism”.
In Western Europe, the flu vaccine is an annual routine for risk groups, while in Poland, only 4% of citizens choose to be vaccinated. Almost half of Poles say they prefer not to get vaccinated against COVID-19, a proportion that reaches 65% among women and is even higher (72%) among those under 40 years of age.
While some celebrities did not hesitate to skip the queue to be vaccinated as soon as possible, other celebrities such as veteran journalist Hanna Lis They were dedicated to spreading doubts about the benefits of injecting a vaccine. Lis says she suffered “the worst trauma of her life” and a near-fatal allergic reaction after receiving a vaccine, without specifying what type of vaccine it was or exactly what side effects she suffered. However, his statements have been wielded by those who resist being immunized against covid-19 and have added fuel to the stake of skepticism. Even public health experts such as Tomasz Sobierajski of the University of Warsaw have criticized the government’s “overly optimistic propaganda” about the vaccine’s effectiveness and safety. As if that were not enough, the Minister of Public Administrations, Janusz Kowalski, declared his refusal to be vaccinated hiding behind “freedom of choice.”
Héctor G. Barnés
–
Poland has designated the nursing home workers, police and military as the next group to receive the vaccine, once the process is completed with the health personnel. It is expected to have six million doses by the end of March and about 50 million more by the end of the year, which in total have cost about 675 million euros. Despite overcoming the first wave much better than the rest of Europe, Poland has suffered in recent months a dramatic increase in the number of cases (about one and a half million currently) and victims (about 34,000), and has already accumulated almost 900 deaths per million inhabitants, more than Portugal and the Netherlands and not far from Spain (1,140).
Current restrictions, which require, for example, to keep hotels and restaurants closed (which can only deliver takeout), are welcomed with disgust by a large part of the population. The movements against these measures have gone from the imaginative, such as the ice skating rink that claimed to sell flowers placed in the center of the rink and facilitated the skates to be able to collect them “without a time limit”, to the provocative, such as the gym who called himself “Temple of the cult of health” to stay open under the exceptions that benefit the churches.
A gymnasium called itself a “temple of the cult of health” to remain open taking advantage of the exceptions that benefit the churches
Others, like the Ars apartments in Krakow, they don’t even try to hide and they have remained open without interruption throughout the pandemic, despite being illegal. When the Government allowed the transit of travelers for business reasons, in these apartments, guests were asked to indicate when they registered that this was the purpose of their stay. When the hospitality industry was restricted to health personnel and patients from the pandemic, the management simply rented the accommodations to anyone – mostly young people who use the apartments as a shared flat. The movement We open (We open) has even reached publish an ‘online’ map of businesses that remain open without respecting the law and it challenges what it calls “economic confinement.” The closure of leisure establishments and shops – except food and hygiene – has been extended until the end of January.
Europa Press
–
Denialist collectives or those who see an international conspiracy behind the pandemic have found sympathizers across the social and political spectrum. Despite calls to “trust science” from the prime minister, the proportion of Poles who fear the vaccine rather than the virus itself is higher. To counter any fear, the Government has announced an economic compensation fund for anyone who suffers side effects after being vaccinated, in addition to offering total exemption from limitations (travel, confinement, mask) for those who have received the vaccine and the booster.
“Getting vaccinated is a show of solidarity and respect for others, the only way to return to normalcy and the only way to protect jobs,” Morawiecki said. The ultimate goal is to achieve so-called community immunity, which is achieved when three-quarters of the population are immune.
On January 15, the online registration was opened so that anyone who wishes can register and be included in the vaccination program against the coronavirus. However, the website stopped working for more than 24 hours and, for now, the number of registered is, according to official sources, “Lower than expected”.
–
