© European commission (audiovisual service)
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Vaccination levels against COVID-19 in Bulgaria since the advent of vaccines a year ago are the lowest in Europe. And although it has already received more than 8.2 million doses of all EU-approved drugs, in almost 12 months since the start of coronavirus vaccination, Sofia has never managed to close the gap with other EU countries.
Outside the map of Europe, the explanations for the low levels of vaccination in Bulgaria put it in a different context.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) announced on Tuesday its analysis of COVID-19 vaccination among the 36 countries in which it operates. The bank, which is owned by the EU, the European Investment Bank and 60 countries, provides loans for projects from Central Asia and the Caucasus, to Central and Eastern Europe and North Africa.
Bulgaria ranks 28th after the 36 countries in which the differences in the percentage of vaccinated population vary from 9% in Armenia to 65% in Lithuania. As a share of its citizens, Bulgaria has fewer vaccinated not only than other European countries financed by the EBRD, but also the Balkans (except Bosnia and Herzegovina), as well as Mongolia, Morocco, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tunisia, Turkey, Russia, Jordan, Lebanon and even Belarus, which has been subject to international sanctions.
© European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)
– Between 9% in Armenia and 65% in Lithuania, vaccination levels in the EBRD-served region are lower than the European average.
Behind Bulgaria in terms of vaccination coverage are only Moldova, Bosnia, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Egypt, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia.
Trust and income
According to the EBRD’s analysis, a key condition for the pace of vaccination is trust in state institutions and bodies. Support for the government is translated into the highest degree of readiness for vaccination.
“People who trust their government are about 8% more likely to have a positive attitude towards vaccination,” the analysis said. The data do not show significant differences among government supporters by gender, level of education and age.
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Study participants were specifically asked if they thought vaccines were safe and effective. The analysis links the answers to these questions to the people’s confidence in the government, taking into account various individual characteristics, including urban living, gender, employment status, age, religion, education level, income and country of residence. says in the study. The conclusions also take into account the mortality rate, per capita income, demographic factors, the quality of economic institutions, the early availability of vaccines, human mobility and other factors.
Economies with higher per capita incomes and better economic institutions have higher levels of vaccination, the EBRD said. According to the study, this is due to better administrative capacity to conduct vaccination campaigns and higher levels of trust, which are usually strongly linked to income and institutions. Measuring the effectiveness of economic institutions averages global governance indicators to control corruption, the rule of law, government efficiency and the quality of law.
An EBRD working document shows that governments face the challenge of convincing the public that vaccines can be trusted, and that the effectiveness of such communication depends on trust in the governments themselves.
Vaccination levels against COVID-19 are generally higher in economies where a larger proportion of the population believes vaccines are safe and effective. In the EBRD regions, the prevalence of such beliefs was relatively low even before the pandemic, the study said. A 10% improvement over vaccines increases the vaccination rate by about 2 percentage points.
The authors of the study also link the level of medical care, pointing out that countries with more vaccinated have a higher number of doctors per capita and started vaccinations earlier.
Together, these factors account for almost 80% of the differences in vaccination levels observed in more than 100 economies. The analysis concludes that the patterns of behavior in the 36 countries financed by the EBRD are in line with those observed in other parts of the world.
The authors link their results to the statistics on deaths from COVID-19 at the beginning of the current epidemic wave:
“.While the mortality rate in developed economies in Europe remains low despite the rise in COVID-19 cases, in the EBRD regions mortality and infection continue to move in parallel,” the study said. of coronavirus infection per million population are four times higher in EBRD-financed regions than in advanced Europe.
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