Chile expects to have vaccinated 5 million people against COVID-19 by the end of March

Barely three weeks after the start of the massive COVID-19 vaccination campaign in Chile, but with positive results behind, the authorities of the Andean country already plan to reach 15 million people vaccinated next June.

Chile is now the first country in Latin America in terms of speed in the process of vaccination against COVID-19. In the latest national report, the authorities announced nearly 3 million vaccinations with an average of 200 thousand vaccinated per day. If it continues to meet expected projections, the country will have inoculated 80% of its population by the middle of this year.

To achieve the goal, It is expected that by the end of March, 5 million vaccinated people will be reached. According to Under Secretary of Health Paula Daza, by the middle of this month it is expected that 3 million people will receive their second dose and 2.5 million people will receive the first. “It’s a very difficult goal, a very difficult goal. But today we see that we are going to be able to achieve this goal, ”he said. This is an encouraging development for the country which, on Tuesday, has more than 20,100 deaths and more than 805,000 infections.

Before the end of February, the Chilean government plans to receive around 4 million doses of the vaccine developed by the Sinovac laboratory. They are expected to arrive in two shipments on different days. By the end of January, the first 4 million doses of the same drug had arrived, in addition to the 316,000 Pfizer / BioNTech vaccines, intended for education workers to start face-to-face classes.

According to the agreements and contracts signed, Chile is expected to receive 35 million doses during 2021. To those mentioned would be added 7.6 million from the Covax plan, 4 million from Johnson & Johnson and an additional 4 million from AstraZeneca.

And the figure could rise: Authorities say progress has been made in negotiations with Russian vaccine makers Sputnik V. In the words of the Russian Ambassador to Chile Sergei Koshkin, there will be news soon. “If we come to an agreement, this vaccine could be here in Chile for the second quarter of this year. I hope so, ”he says. According to reports, Chile expects to have 8 million of these doses, for which the approval to be provided by the Institute of Public Health (ISP) is already underway.

However, there are also alarms in Chile that are coming from different sectors that call into question the production capacity of drugs by the laboratories, which could delay the plan of the Chilean government. For this reason, the calendars have been made more flexible, so as not to create expectations among people waiting for vaccination.

Total vaccination and the example of Israel

According to the ISP, group or herd immunity it is “the protection of a certain population against infection due to the presence of a high percentage of immune individuals”. The Chilean government plans to achieve it around June 2021.

“We calculated that to have herd immunity, 80% of the susceptible population must be vaccinated. And we hope to achieve this by the end of June, not before July 1, ”said Minister of Health Enrique Paris.

The Minister also indicated that, according to the studies that have been developed so far, an effect could be observed in the reduction of cases and hospitalizations when 30% of the population is already vaccinated. “I will give the example of Israel, which has a very large part of the vaccinated population, and in these countries, where 30% of the population was vaccinated, a drop was already observed in people hospitalized in treatment units. intensive, and even observed a decrease in mortality, ”he explained.

The controversies of the Chilean process

On the Chilean path to vaccination errors were not missed which created certain moments of tension. Charges of “privilege”, “exceptions” and “team progress” with vaccines are just some of the situations that have arisen during these three weeks of massive inoculation.

One of the most critical moments occurred on Saturday, February 13, when Rodolfo Carter, the mayor of the municipality of La Florida, a city that is part of the Chilean capital, start vaccination of education workers, which was set by the government for February 22. The decision forced the government to draft a resolution to avoid “extreme flexibility” of certain municipalities during vaccination. A flexibility that was also seen when mayors like Gervoy Paredes, from the city of Puerto Montt, in southern Chile, offered vaccines to a group of basketball players, or when Raquel Argandoña, a prominent television woman, was vaccinated in the municipality of Las Condes before it corresponded, with the consent of the mayor Joaquín Lavín. Although these are specific and controlled situations, they had to be dealt with quickly so as not to create a mess in a process which, in general, was orderly.

On February 19, a report from the Department of Health Statistics and Information (DEIS) details that 37,306 people aged 18 to 59, classified as “healthy population”, were vaccinated in Chile., ignoring the standards set by the vaccination schedule set up by the Ministry of Health.

Most of these vaccinations were recorded in the municipality of La Florida, which led President Sebastián Piñera to ask all mayors and regional authorities to meet the established standard. “I reiterate my request that they strictly adhere to the priority for age and comorbidity in the vaccination process,” the president told ministers, deputy secretaries, mayors and governors.

The next calendar

From this Monday February 22 to Friday February 26, the Chilean vaccination schedule will focus on vaccination people over 65 who remain, in addition to people with and without chronic diseases over 65. Education workers between the ages of 59 and 40 should also do this.

In March, the immunization schedule will start immunizing people over 64 to 60 years of age, with or without morbidity. Also on this date, inoculation of education workers will continue, but between 23 and 39 years old.

From Wednesday March 3, it is expected that the administration of the second doses will begin for those who have already been vaccinated in the first days of the process.

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