Mass vaccination: among the logistical problems …

“These days are the best thing that has ever happened to us. Less than a year ago, the pandemic started and there are already countries that have started to vaccinate. It’s remarkable and at the same time it’s relieving to see how nations approve vaccines to begin with the logistics of injecting their people, ”says Ernesto Resnik, an Argentinian molecular biologist and biotechnologist residing in the United States. And then he continues his explanation by insisting on a point to underline: “There is a certain delay, the production ended up being a little more problematic than expected. While labs started scaling it up long before it received approval, the case is a bit delayed. Anyway, nothing masks the fact that by the middle of 2021 a large part of the world population is vaccinated, it’s fantastic», He maintains.

Mass vaccination processes have already started in some countries and the first alarms have started to rise. That the Russian prevents alcohol consumption and that the holidays arrive, that that of Pfizer and BioNTech generates undesirable effects in allergic people … While specialists are struggling to provide explanations, governments are trying to calibrate the logistics so that ‘they reach more citizens. The advantage of a country like Argentina is that during these days – while waiting for the first 600 thousand doses of Sputnik V – it will be able to evaluate the successes and the mistakes that it should not repeat if it wants to contribute a large-scale vaccination. , soon, to stop the pandemic. Then, back to the experiences of the United Kingdom and Russia, territories where it all started last week, and the United States, where everything will start from Monday.

United Kingdom

The UK Medicines and Health Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) cleared the Pfizer / BioNTech variant for COVID-19 on December 3. In this way, the UK became the first country in the world to approve the vaccine. In England, 50 health centers have been selected to start vaccination, which has also started in parallel at hospitals in Scotland, Wales and Ireland. From the UK government they have ordered 40 million doses (which will be used to vaccinate 20 million citizens), 4 million are expected to arrive before the end of 2020 and at present the first 800,000 are being distributed seniors and staff. sanitary. Logistics is presented, in this sense, as the biggest challenge because every minute lost is worth lives. In total, the country has already exceeded 63 thousand deaths and that’s nearly 2 million infections.

One of the most recurring themes of this first week was side effects the active substance generated in people with a serious history of allergies. Two workers belonging to the National Health Service faced reactions (an anaphylactoid condition) and from there it began to be recommended not to inoculate this RNA vaccine to people with these characteristics. Somehow, they were already anticipating that such a situation could be triggered because they had epinephrine autoinjectors with them and were ready for immediate treatment. However, it should be noted that the episode does not question the safety or effectiveness of the vaccine. What has happened, according to specialists, usually happens with other vaccines.

The MHRA deserved credit for launching the most ambitious global immunization process in history. Behind the UK agency, other regulators from different governments have already joined forces to move forward with the approvals. To date, authorizations have already been added to start distributing the vaccine in countries like the United States, Bahrain, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Mexico.

Russia

Noting that the UK was getting a head start on approving the use of the Pfizer and BioNTech variants, the UK government Vladimir Putin ordered the start of the massive inoculation of its inhabitants the next day, Saturday December 5.. With this, the Eurasian giant became the first nation to inject the active substance of Sputnik V into its citizens. After a week of work against the clock, the process progresses steadily and, per case, more than 10,000 military personnel have already been vaccinated and the goal is to reach 100,000 before the end of 2020. However, covid does not give way, with an average of 28,000 new infections and more than 600 deaths per day. With these new figures, Russia stands out with a cumulative figure that exceeds two and a half million infected and 46,000 deaths.

Russia was in the eye of a nueva fake news, by disseminating “unknown information” about his vaccine. Newspapers and portals around the world have decontextualized the words of Russian Deputy Minister Tatiana Golíkova on the need to “reducing the use of drugs and alcohol that can suppress the immune system in the first 42 days“After applying the first dose. Confronted with this, Conicet researchers walked in and said there was not enough scientific evidence to say that alcohol consumption may inhibit the drug’s effectiveness in generating the necessary defenses against future covid-19 infection and that, in effect, it wouldn’t be counterproductive. Two days later, faced with the agitation generated, it was Alexander Ginzburg, director of the Gamaleya Center, who closed the debate: “Of course, we are not talking about a total ban on alcohol during vaccination. . There is only talk of a reasonable limitation of consumption until the body has formed its immune response to the coronavirus infection. “

Meanwhile, the negotiations do not stop. Alberto Fernández reported that after the contract with the Sovereign Fund of the Russian Federation, 600,000 doses would arrive before the end of the year and that from 2021 enough doses will arrive to vaccinate 10 million Argentines between January and February. At the same time, the Gamaleya Center, in charge of its production and clinical trials, proposed to the AstraZeneca laboratory, which works in collaboration with the University of Oxford, to combine its preparations so that the candidate of the British institutions ( which It will also be used to inoculate Argentines from March) can improve its effectiveness. It should be noted that it had reached an average efficiency of 70%, the average obtained between two different lines of research. While the Russian variant had conquered no less than 95%.

“News about candidate effectiveness is always good. With figures above 90%, they offer the possibility of eradicating the disease within a few years. Even the most problematic of all, like AstraZeneca’s, has achieved an excellent percentage and performs better than those of the others who work and are included in the calendars, like the flu one, ”says Resnik. And he concludes: “What happened with the AstraZeneca is curious because it is the one in which we placed the most chips and the laboratory that did the best.”

United States

“If, a few months ago, they told us that vaccination here in the United States was going to start in December and that by mid-2021 a large part of its population would be vaccinated, it seemed crazy to us. It’s absolutely fantastic what’s going on. The relief is great, ”admits Resnik. The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has already approved the emergency use of the vaccine developed by pharmaceutical companies Pfizer (USA) and BioNTech (Germany) and, as planned, they will receive 2.9 million doses that they will be looking to start applying between Monday and Tuesday. The good news emerges amid growing tension, as infections and the number of deaths reach alarming numbers. According to data provided by Johns Hopkins University, a statistical benchmark throughout the pandemic, It is the country most affected by the pathogen, with nearly 16 million cases and more than 295,000 deaths. Under this premise, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows warned FDA Director Stephen Hahn that “he could prepare his resignation if he did not immediately process the vaccine clearance.”

The first to receive the drug will be healthcare workers and elderly residents of nursing homes, who are the highest priority groups. On the other hand, attentive to what happened in the United Kingdom, they recommend not to administer the vaccine to people with a clinical history of severe allergies. At the same time, the United States is facing a wave of infections that does not stop. With an economy in critical condition, some states, like New York, are resuming restrictions from past months in order to put out new lights. As their Governor, Andrew Cuomo has warned, they will take action such as closing the city’s indoor dining rooms, while keeping exteriors open and home delivery. To cite an illustrative case, in this state, hospitalizations rose to 5,300 while in September they had an average of 400. The country is going through a painful present, with 200,000 infections per day and an average of nearly 3,000 deaths per day.

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