Has Euskadi reached the vaccination ceiling?

Two years from the biggest health crisis of the last century, it has been a while since vaccination ceased to be a priority for the Basques. 92% of those over 12 years old he has two doses of vaccine against covid and it does not seem that this digit is going to give no growth spurt.

because the figure from January to February only grew three tenths. In other words, in January it was 92.5% and in February it was 92.8%. The oscillations are minimal and the numbers barely vary because from now on each time is harder achieve increases between stragglers.

Euskadi has already administered more than four and a half million doses and more than 1,840,000 Basques have the complete program. Although the message remains vaccinate at all costsWhat is not so clear is where is the ceilinggiven that it is hardly possible to capture more of the population that can be vaccinated, because refused to prick.

The young people between 20 and 29 years old they are the ones who continue to show a greater rejection of the inoculation, with 86.1% with the complete guideline. The percentage of immunized is practically identical among thirtysomething and amounts to 86.6%.

INFANT VACCINATION, STALLED

At the moment, the one that has become entrenched the most has been pediatric vaccination. Because the Basque Health Service has received 228,000 Pfizer childhood vaccines and has only administered 112,455, that is, 49%. Still, 84,126 children have received at least one needle stick and 41,284 are fully immunized.

Stagnation is a fact. In January, the coverage of the child population amounted to 56.8% and in February it had only been achieved raise a point up to 57.9%.

It is the health authorities themselves that admit that immunization in this group has suffered a sudden stop and attribute it to high infection rate between boys and girls in the sixth wave, since parents have gone losing fear of the virus. At the beginning of December, families rushed to make an appointment for their little ones, but these requests have been relaxed for weeks.

REINFORCEMENTS, WITHOUT SUCCESS

The reinforcements have also not achieved the planned follow-up in certain age groups because have reached more than 90% among those over 60 but they are far below among those younger than that age.

This extra vaccine also it is no longer an emergency for a society that is hardly going to inoculate itself with reinforcement antidotes. And that it was seen that immunity began to decrease around five months, so it was necessary to add a booster dose that has not progressed at the desired rate either.

According to a response sent to the Basque Parliament, 10% of Basques do not go to appointments that he had arranged to receive the third dose. That 10% excludes, as explained in the letter, those who book an appointment but do not meet the requirements to receive the punctures because not enough time has passed after their infection, a recurring problem after the last wave.

These desertions do not imply, however, that doses are wasted given that expiration dates have been extended and there is greater flexibility in the storage of vaccines. Even so, Osakidetza works to adjust the vials and the doses to the number of people who come.

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