The expected first vaccines against COVID-19 arrived as a gift for all Portuguese, at Christmas time, with vaccination starting on 27 December 2020. In the first phase, health professionals from hospitals, directly associated with the treatment of patients with COVID-19 and, after a few days, on 2 January, persons living in homes (ERPI) and professionals from those institutions.

All Portuguese are looking forward to the unfolding of this vaccination plan. Experts and some public opinion, with more or less criteria, comment on the implemented strategies: they consider that it could be carried out more quickly, that different vaccination strategies could be used, that vaccines are arriving in Portugal very slowly, and that the vaccination criteria could be different.

But then, how has Portugal done so far? Compared to other affected countries, how do we stand? Vaccinating too much or too little?

In order to compare, we checked the Bloomberg  website that aggregates vaccination tracking globally and also information made available in abridged form by our National Health System.

On 8 January in Portugal, the first publication on this topic on the official social networks shows that 70 thousand vaccines had been administered.

 

 

A week later, on 15 January, it was announced in Instagram and Facebook that 106 thousand vaccines had been given. The Bloomberg website, accessed that day, indicated that we are the 20th country with the most vaccines administered, which means that, at the moment, we had one person vaccinated out of 100. At that time, the country with the most vaccines was Israel with 24 vaccinated people in 100 people.

 

 

On 22 January 2021, we checked the referred sources again, which indicated that 212 thousand vaccines had been administered, and no differentiation between the 1st dose and the 2nd dose had been made. This means that the 212 thousand vaccines administered does not necessarily mean 212 thousand people administered the 1st dose. 

 

 

According to the Bloomberg website accessed on 25 January, the numbers of vaccines in Portugal were slightly higher. With more than 258 thousand vaccines administered, Portugal was the 19th country with the most vaccines administered, 2 people out of 100.

 

 

On 27 January,  the Bloomberg website restructured its tables and indicated the percentage of people vaccinated with the first dose and the second in each country. Portugal is the 21st country with the most vaccines administered, with 2% of the population having taken the first dose and 0.3% of the population with two doses already administered. Israel continues to be the country with the most people inoculated: 30% of the population administered the first dose and 14% of the population with the two.

 

 

Being still far from this performance, we all hope that more doses of vaccines will arrive quickly, that vaccination strategies will be made more flexible, restructured and accelerated. For all of us, especially the most fragile and unprotected.

 

References:

Website SNS24 - https://www.sns24.gov.pt/tema/doencas-infecciosas/covid-19/vacina-covid-19/

SNS Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/sns_pt/

Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-vaccine-tracker-global-distribution/

 

 

Sónia Teixeira 

Editorial Team