Nearly 4 million vaccines arrive from AstraZeneca to strengthen the vaccination plan – Telam

During this month, 3,960,000 doses will arrive in Argentina under the contract signed last year with the pharmaceutical company,

the The vaccination plan is progressing with the arrival of the doses of Oxford / AstraZeneca, scheduled for the month of May, which will be added to those already applied in the country -Sputnik, Covishield and Sinopharm-, with the aim of covering the largest possible number of the population, after having vaccinated the elderly, health personnel and teachers.

According to the official report, during this month 3,960,000 doses will arrive in the country under the contract signed last year with the pharmaceutical laboratory, for 22,400,000 vaccines, To which will be added another 861,600 through the Covax mechanism, of the World Health Organization, and the loads already arrived a few days ago from Moscow of the Sputnik V vaccine on the flights of Aerolneas Argentinas.

AstraZeneca produces the active principle of its drug against Covid-19 in the laboratory of Grupo Insud in the province of Buenos Aires and sends them for “formulation” in Mexico, from where they will then be distributed.

Doses arrived

To date, Argentina has received a total of 12,698,250 doses, including the Sputnik V, Sinopharm and AstraZeneca vaccines.

The country has already received 1,082,400 doses of AstraZeneca through the WHO COVAX mechanism.

Of this total, 6,535,850 doses correspond to the Sputnik V vaccine (5,475,690 for the first component and 1,060,160 for the second component); 4,000,000 from a Sinopharm; 580,000 at Covishield / AstraZeneca; y 1,082,400 from AstraZeneca received through the COVAX mechanism of the World Health Organization.

Between December and January, 820,150 doses of Sputnik arrived in the country (410,150 of the first component and 410,000 of the second).

In February, a total of 2,497,890 arrived: 917,890 correspond to the Sputnik V vaccine (729,090 in component 1 and 188,800 in component 2); 580,000 at Covishield and 1,000,000 at Sinopharm.

In March, 2,452,870 doses of Covid-19 vaccine were received. Of this total, 2,234,470 are Sputniks (1,773,110 of component 1 and 461,360 of component 2) and 218,400 AstraZeneca of the Covax mechanism.

With the Sputnik V shipments that arrived on Aerolneas Argentinas flights a few days ago, all over 60s registered in the country will have been vaccinated with a dose.“

In April, a total of 5,927,340 vaccines arrived in the country, of which 2,063,340 came from component 1 of Sputnik; 864,000 from AstraZeneca of the Covax mechanism and 3,000,000 from Sinopharm.

In turn, in the period from Monday March 29 to Sunday May 2, more than 6 million vaccines (6,229,430) arrived in Argentina, of which 4,393,725 were applied.

According to official sources, With the Sputnik V shipments that arrived on Aerolneas Argentinas flights a few days ago, everyone over 60 years of age registered in the country will have been vaccinated with a dose.

Alberto Fernández and his interest in getting more vaccines

Regarding the possibility of having more doses of vaccines, President Alberto Fernndez said that the link with the American laboratory Pfizer for the purchase of vaccines against the coronavirus “has not been broken” and affirmed that the Argentine government continues to “negotiate until today”.

President Alberto Fernndez during a videoconference with AstraZeneca executives.

“The first vaccine that was authorized in Argentina for administration was Pfizer; We had a vested interest in having Pfizer and then there was a series of contractual issues with Pfizer US that started to make it difficult to make a deal and buy the vaccines.“, you review the president.

In this regard, he recalled that during his recent international tour, he had asked if he “could buy the Pfizer vaccine directly from Europe”, but was told that on this continent “they had problems of supply ”with this laboratory, in addition to the fact that the doses produced in Europe are“ prohibited for export to third countries ”.

However, the head of state reaffirmed that he would continue to “work so that Argentines have all the vaccines” to face the coronavirus.

One dose Israel

Following this line, the Israeli-Argentine vaccine BriLife will conduct its phase three studies in the country with a model that aims to produce millions of doses in Argentina with Israeli technology and distribute it around the world, for which experts from this countries held a meeting.

With the Sputnik V shipments arriving a few days ago, all over 60s registered in the country will have been vaccinated with a dose.

In another order, Vizzotti and Presidential Advisor Cecilia Nicolini have moved forward in managing the possibility of speeding up a delivery schedule for component 2 of the Sputnik V vaccine and thus supplementing the immunization schedules.

Postpone the second dose

About, the clinician Luis Cmera, member of the committee which advises the president Alberto Fernndez, assured on Monday that the second application of the Sputnik V vaccine could be “stretched” up to “three or four months” since most of its effectiveness is achieved with the first dose.

“Up to three or four months, the application of the second dose can be prolonged. Sputnik has been shown to be extremely effective with the first, achieving an immunity very similar to what one would already have with the second,” said he declared. that the second dose what it does is give it durability over time.

“The second dose temporarily boosts immunity, but you can’t tell because real life isn’t exactly the same as in the lab,” he says.

Cmera said that it is estimated that the protective effect of the vaccine is about a year, although little time has passed to be certain of the duration of immunity since the first vaccines were applied between December and January.