Second stage of vaccination targeting chronically ill and elderly over 60 to kick off on Jan 15. Vaccination campaign in Gaesti under scrutiny

The second stage of the vaccination campaign in Romania, targeting around 4 million elderly aged over 60 and chronically ill, is to kick off as of January 15, the coordinator of the vaccination campaign, military doctor Valeriu Gheorghita told a press conference on Tuesday.

The third stage of vaccination, covering the Romanian population, is set for early April “as a realistic deadline”.

“We estimate that the second stage of vaccination can start on January 15. This stage will start with people who are admitted in the social and medical centres, roughly 40,000 people The vaccination of the staff will be made through mobile teams. We are starting now the procedures to obtain the informed consent on the vaccination, including from the caregivers.

Overall in the second stage around 4 million people aged over 60 and chronically ill could be vaccinated.

We estimate that early April is a realistic deadline to consider for starting the third stage of the vaccination. It will also depend on the pace of the delivery of the vaccine doses. The pace of the first stage of vaccination will be probably on the rise. There are 87 doses of vaccines lost or wasted so far“, Valeriu Gheorghita pointed out.

He added that the vaccination time frame against COVID-19 for a young person without chronic conditions is early April.

Anyone who wanted could be vaccinated at Gaesti hospital. Manager says he refused to throw away unused doses

The vaccination centre from the town hospital in Gaesti accepted for vaccination anyone who wanted, although we are still in the first stage of vaccination when only the healthcare workers are supposed to get the anti-Covid 19 vaccine. The hospital manager said there are unused doses of vaccine and that he refused to throw them away, so he decided to vaccinate anyone willing to take it, regardless of age or degree of risk.

In retort, military doctor Valeriu Gheorghita said he had been informed about this case. “It is important that citizens had been vaccinated. The fact that procedures had not been followed is another thing that is to be checked. I consider it is a case of mismanagement”, he said.