Spain to probe whether military top brass jumped jab queue dodging vaccine protocols

Spain’s Defense Ministry is set to launch an internal inquiry to investigate if the military top brass dodged coronavirus vaccine protocols by receiving a jab before their turn. An online news site in Spain, El Confidencial Digital, reported that Chief of Staff Gen. Miguel Ángel Villarroya and several other high-ranking officers in Spain''s Armed Forces have been vaccinated with the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine. Nursing home residents and staff as well as all the frontline workers are receiving jabs as priority groups in Spain’s National Vaccination Plan. However, the vaccine rollout has been suffering a delay due to a shortage of deliveries by Pfizer-BioNTech.

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According to reports by PTI, the Health Ministry, this week announced that the next group will be people above the age of 80. On Friday, January 22, Defense Minister Margarita Robles said that the Armed Forces had their own vaccination plan, but that she nevertheless had requested a report from Gen. Villarroya to clarify the issue. The questions are related to several cases of queue-jumping by politicians or people with connections. This has been drawing widespread criticism which has led to high-profile dismissals.

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Moderna vaccine in Spain 

The European Commission has authorised the Moderna vaccine, which became the second COVID vaccine approved by the bloc following the authorisation of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. The European Medical Agency (EMA) has said that a “very large clinical trial” showed Moderna’s vaccine to be 94.1 per cent effective. The EU agency said that the trial included 30,000 people between 18 to 94 years of age. The trial proved the vaccine is safe and effective and also showed the efficacy of 90.9% in people with chronic lung disease, heart disease, obesity, liver disease, diabetes, or HIV infection. Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine is administered in two doses, 28 days apart.

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(Image Credits: AP)