A shipment of 216,000 Pfizer pediatric vaccines against the coronavirus arrived this Thursday at the Ezeiza airport and in the remainder of this month “one and a half million doses” will arrive in the country more, within the framework of the vaccination campaign to ensure a “return to safe classrooms” for the start of the new school year.
The cargo arrived at 10:20 a.m. at the Ezeiza international airport, aboard an American Airlines flight from Miami.
In a press conference at the airport, the Secretary for Access to Health, Sandra Tirado, explained that The doses will be destined for the population between 5 and 11 years old, to initiate vaccination schemes or place a second dose.
“This is the first shipment that will continue to arrive during February and March. The idea is that they add to the vaccines that are already being administered in the pediatric and adolescent population, taking into account the return to school,” Tirado said.
According to the contracts signed so far, in 2022 Argentina will receive a total of 24.9 million doses from Pfizer for the advancement of the Strategic Vaccination Plan against the coronavirus.
Pediatric vaccines will allow vaccination coverage to continue to climb this year also in the adolescent population between 12 and 17 years old, as well as in boys and girls between 5 and 11 years old, it was officially reported.
Minutes before, the spokeswoman for the Presidency, Gabriela Cerruti, had announced the arrival of the shipment, that “it forms part of the agreement signed by Argentina to acquire 18 million doses”.
“We are going to have one and a half million more doses during February that are going to arrive to continue completing the schemes,” The spokeswoman announced at the usual press conference that the spokeswoman offers at Government House on Thursdays.
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For his part, Tirado recalled that in January Anmat’s authorization to incorporate the Pfizer vaccine into the pediatric population was made official.
“The idea -said the official- is that these doses are added to vaccines that we are already administering to the pediatric and adolescent population, and especially now with all the work we are doing with the start of school, that is, they are added to the dose that we have been applying from Sinopharm, especially for the population from 5 to 11 years old”.
Until now A total of 110 million vaccines against the coronavirus arrived in the country, of which 98,494,387 doses were distributed and 91,698,060 applied, according to figures updated today by the public vaccination monitor.
A total of 40,130,168 people have started the vaccination scheme; 35,919,881 people have the complete scheme (two doses); 12,608,149 received a booster dose and 3,039,862 received an additional dose.
“What we have to do now is to reach the time of autumn and winter with the largest number of doses placed and, later – depending on how the evolution continues – we will see if it is necessary or not to place a new reinforcement,” said today the Health portfolio official.
In this framework, he stressed: “we are going to have an autumn and winter with full presence, with full activity, which is going to generate a greater circulation of respiratory viruses in general”.
Meanwhile, Cerutti -at the press conference in the Government- stressed that the number of vaccinated people allows us to say “with some kind of calm, that the last wave of the pandemic could be surfed quite calmly, despite the fact that of course we regret each of the deaths that have occurred.
“We are prepared to start the school year on March 2 with the majority of the educational community having completed their vaccination schedule, and this gives us peace of mind that we are going to have a school year with extensive presence in the classrooms in all levels,” stressed the spokeswoman.
Finally, he said that “it is a sign that the responsibilities, rights and duties in Argentina are made flesh in the community” and concluded: “It is very important that this vaccination scheme, especially in boys and girls, ends to be fulfilled before classes begin to have safe classrooms, with protection, mask, distance, ventilation and with all the measures that each district will take in a particular way.
