WARSAW / SOFIA: Europe launched a major COVID-19 vaccination campaign on Sunday (December 27) to try to prevent the spread of coronavirus infection but many Europeans are skeptical about the speed at which vaccines have been confirm and agree and are unwilling to be shot.
The European Union has secured contracts with a range of drug dealers including Pfizer and BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca, for more than two billion doses in total and has targeted adults to be included next year.
But studies have indicated that there are high rates of inoculation in countries from France to Poland, many of which are used to vaccines taking decades to develop, not just months.
“I don’t think there’s a vaccine in history that has been proven so quickly,” said Ireneusz Sikorski, 41, as he graduated from a church in central Warsaw with his two children.
“I’m not saying the vaccination shouldn’t happen. But I’m not going to test an unconfirmed vaccine on my children, or on myself.”
Studies in Poland, where trust in public institutions is running deep, have shown that, for now, less than 40% of people expect to be vaccinated. On Sunday, only half of the medical staff were in a hospital in Warsaw where the first sighting in the country was given a signature.
In Spain, one of the toughest countries in Europe, a German, originally a 28-year-old singer and composer from Tenerife, now plans to wait for it.
“He was nowhere near anyone (COVID-19). Clearly I’m not saying he doesn’t exist because a lot of people have died with it, but for now I wouldn’t have it (the vaccine ). “
There was an Orthodox Christian bishop in Bulgaria, where 45 percent of people have said they would not be seen and 40 percent plan to wait to see if any negative side effects appear, compared to COVID-19 to polio.
“Myself, I’m getting vaccinated against everything I can be,” Bishop Tihon told reporters after receiving his photo, standing next to a minister of health in Sofia.
He talked about concerns about polio before the vaccine came in the 1950s and 1960s.
“We were all trembling with fear of catching polio. And then we were overjoyed,” he said. “Now, we have to believe people. It’s sad.”
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The widespread laziness does not seem to take into account the scientific developments in recent decades.
The traditional method of creating vaccines – containing a weak or deadly virus, or a piece of one, to stimulate the body ‘s immune system – takes more than a decade on average, according to a 2013 study. One pandemic flu vaccine took eight years while a hepatitis B vaccine was nearly 18 years old.
The Moderna vaccine, based on the technology known as ribonucleic acid (mRNA), went from gene sequencing to the first human injection in 63 days.
“We will look back at the advances made in 2020 and say: ‘It was a time when science made great strides’,” said Jeremy Farrar, director of Oxford University’ s Clinical Research Unit, with support from Wellcome Trust.
The Pfizer-BioNTech image has been linked to a few cases of severe allergic reactions as it has been distributed in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has not shown long-term adverse effects in clinical trials.
Independent pollutant Alpha Research said their recent study suggested that less than one in five Bulgarians would be from the first groups to receive the vaccine – face therapists, pharmacists, teachers and nursing home staff – volunteer to be shot.
An IPSOS study of 15 countries published on 5 November then showed that 54 per cent of French would have a COVID vaccine if one were available. The figure was 64 per cent in Italy and Spain, 79 per cent in Britain and 87 per cent in China.
A later IFOP poll – which did not have comparable data for other countries – showed that only 41 per cent of people in France would take the picture.
In Sweden, where public confidence in authorities is running high as elsewhere in the Nordics, more than two thirds want to be vaccinated. However, some say no.
“If someone gave me € 10 million, I would not accept it,” Lisa Renberg, 32, said Wednesday.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki urged Poles on Sunday to sign a vaccine, saying they were affected by the herd’s immune impact.
Critics have said that Warsaw’s national leaders have been over-accepting anti-vaccine views in the past in a bid to rally supportive support.
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