Chile kicks off its most ambitious plan: vaccinating 3.1 million people against COVID-19 in 15 days

Chile has clear targets to vaccinate 80% of its population against the coronavirus by the end of June this year. With the arrival of 4 million new Coronavac vaccines, from the Sinovac laboratory last Friday, Government plan to vaccinate 3.1 million people begins in the country during the first 15 days of March.

The above has been proposed by the government itself as a “demanding” goal, which will not require less logistical efforts, but in line with the objectives that have been set in the Chilean national vaccination plan: vaccinate the entire high-risk population, about five million people, by the end of March; and vaccinate the entire target population, about 15 million people, during the first half of the year.

According to President Sebastián Piñera, to vaccinate an additional 3.1 million Chileans, the country must vaccinate around 300,000 people per day. In addition, there were around 1,400 vaccination points distributed throughout the country.

To achieve the proposed goal, it was announced that from this Wednesday the vaccination of the second doses began to whom it corresponds by calendar. As of this week, vaccination also began for people aged 64 to 60 with and without comorbidity, as well as for preschool and school educators aged 39 to under 23.

In addition, it has been corrected that From this week, patients on dialysis with hemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis will be vaccinated patients over 16 years of age, solid organ transplant patients and patients with cancer and autoimmune diseases under treatment over 16 years of age.

According to the Chilean government, they believe that their vaccination program rests on “solid and secure foundations”, and they called for continuing the vaccination process and respecting the established changes.

New Pfizer vaccines arrive in Chile

To complete the vaccination of 3.1 million people, this Wednesday a new shipment of 200,000 Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines arrived in the country. According to information from the authorities, This is the company’s seventh shipment to arrive in the country, and the eleventh if the four shipments of Sinovac doses that have already arrived in Chile are added.

To help meet the target of 3.1 million new vaccines, he is currently negotiating for another drug to approach Chile: in this case, it would be Johnson & Johnson, recently authorized by the United States. According to company representatives, the application for approval should be submitted soon to the Chilean Institute of Public Health (ISP), although there is no fixed date for the arrival of these doses.

“We are in talks with them, we have had a constant conversation with them. Certain elements related to the contract and certain insurance policies are in the process of being corrected. Therefore, we do not yet have an exact date when we can say that these vaccines will arrive, ”said Minister of Health, Enrique Paris.

It should be remembered that the arrival of the Sputnik V vaccine is also being processed. Russian Ambassador to Chile Sergei Koshkin reported that Negotiations with the government are advanced to finalize the purchase of at least 8 million doses. “If we come to an agreement, this vaccine could be here in Chile for the second quarter of this year. Hopefully so, ”said the Russian authority.

In addition, the Chilean government negotiated the arrival of more Sinovac vaccines than initially planned to continue the mass vaccination plan. “With Sinovac, we are also negotiating an increase in the number of doses, which was originally 10 million, but it was possible to move forward quickly, I cannot give the figure yet, significantly increasing with Sinovac,” said declared Paris.

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