Mass Coronavirus vaccination program begins in EU; Bloc's chief calls it 'touching moment'

The European Union on December 27 launched a co-ordinated vaccine rollout to fight against the unprecedented coronavirus pandemic. Medical workers, nursing home residents, and politicians are set to be inoculated, in what the bloc’s top official says is a “touching moment of unity”. While taking to Twitter, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine had been delivered to all 27 member states on Saturday. 

According to BBC, some EU countries had started administering the jabs on Saturday and they had said that they were not prepared to wait another day. Countries including Germany, Hungary, and Slovakia began the EU immunisation a day earlier. The rollout marks a moment of hope for a region that includes some of the world’s earliest and worst-hit virus hot-spots and a region which so far has reported more than 335,000 COVID-related deaths. 

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EMA to deliver verdict on Moderna on Jan 6 

The latest development comes after the EU authorised the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine on December 21. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) had said that it was recommending the shot be licensed for use in people over 16 years of age with some exceptions. Von der Leyen had also said that the EU drug regulator would deliver their verdict on Moderna’s vaccine on January 6, potentially giving Europe a second tool with which to battle the unprecedented pandemic early in the new year. 

Meanwhile, the inoculation programme begins a new strain of coronavirus has been detected in countries across Europe. With over 1,000 cases of the variant discovered in the UK, scientists are puzzled to determine if the variant, named as VUI-202012/01, falls into which category or if it represents an increased health risk especially when some nations began administering the COVID-19 vaccines among people. The EMA’s head of Anti-infectives and Vaccines Marco Cavaleri said that it was “really too early” to say if the new variant of the virus would compromise the strength of the vaccine, but that “for the time being we are not worried”. 

(with inputs from AP)

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