January 22, 2021 - Croatia will suspend new Pfizer vaccinations for the time being as there are not enough doses currently available.
T.portal reports that the director of the Institute of Public Health, Krunoslav Capak, expressed dissatisfaction with the dynamics of vaccine delivery to Croatia during a press conference on Friday. Capak noted that it is not operating according to how it was negotiated and signed, and they are now receiving reduced quantities.
"Moderna informed us yesterday that it would be a week late with delivery and that it would reduce our doses," Capak said, adding that the vaccination plan must now be restructured.
"We don’t have the Pfizer vaccine for new vaccinations, but we will now have to keep what we have for revaccination," Capak said, adding that 11,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine should arrive in early February.
He said that the quantities of vaccines coming are 'far below what we negotiated, and it is made even more difficult for us by the fact that they were initially given larger quantities, and now they are reduced.'
"We will certainly be able to vaccinate for the second dose, but we will have to suspend new vaccinations," Capak said. "Through individual contacts with European Commission officials and producers, we seek our rights, but so far, this has remained only an attempt," he added.
"We are now in a situation where we have to restructure our vaccination plan; now we are storing the Pfizer vaccine exclusively for the second dose and waiting until mid-February to get some larger quantities. Moderna promised us that they would deliver what they promised the week after the first one, and we can only hope that'll be the case," said Capak.
The AstraZeneca vaccine is likely to be registered on January 29, and distribution will follow soon after. The European Union is currently working on the distribution by member states.
Capak also spoke about when he expects the general population to be largely vaccinated.
"It all depends on the delivery of the vaccine. We are ready for much faster vaccination, all county public health institutes, health centers, and family doctors are ready for it, but we do not have vaccines. If AstraZeneca delivers larger quantities after registration, we could vaccinate much faster. I think that together with all the other doses, it was promised that we would have the general population largely vaccinated by the summer," said Capak on Jutarnji List.
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