Experts and politicians opposed the German government on Saturday for failing to ensure an adequate supply of vaccine doses ahead of the country’s coronavirus vaccination campaign.
As a member of the EU vaccine supply scheme, Germany relies on regulators at European level to allow the vaccine to prevent COVID-19 infection.
But the EU has taken longer than countries like the UK, USA and Canada to approve.
So far, only the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine has been approved in EU member states, but the block as a whole has only ordered 300 million doses in the summer, with the belief that more vaccine options available.
Frauke Zipp, a psychiatrist and member of the consulting Leopoldina Academy of Sciences, on Saturday accused German lawyers of not getting a glimpse of vaccine supply.
“I think the current situation is a great failure,” she said The welt newspaper. “Why didn’t they prescribe a lot more of the vaccine in the summer just to be safe?”
The founders of BioNTech said on Friday that they were scrambling to boost production after being under pressure to fill the gaps caused by the EU failure.
German Health Minister Jens Spahn has rejected any proposal the government has made redundant regarding the country’s vaccines. “Things are going exactly as planned,” he told broadcaster RTL.
Spahn said he initially expected deficiencies and that the government would have to “prioritize” who would be vaccinated but that all nursing home residents would be vaccinated by the end of January.
Vaccination is a ‘race against time’
Luxembourg’s foreign minister, Jean Asselborn, defended the EU’s vaccination strategy on German radio broadcaster RBB, saying the commission had received nearly two billion doses from six different manufacturers.
However, Karl Lauterbach, a health expert told the center-left Social Democrats Post Rheinische newspaper that it was difficult for Brussels to fail to buy more of the Moderna vaccine. “
“It was clear early on that the Moderna vaccine had strong efficacy and could be used by GPs.”
Lauterbach believes it is too late for the Moderna vaccine to play any major role in Germany ‘s short – term vaccination needs. He also criticized the EU for not ordering more BioNTech-Pfizer vaccines early on.
Bernd Riexinger, co-chair of the Socialist Left Party, called on Health Minister Jens Spahn directly to ensure more BioNTech-Pfizer jabs are made.
He said with the release of the new COVID-19 variant in the UK, “a successful vaccination strategy is also a race against time.”
Shut-down cannot end prematurely
Chancellor Angela Merkel is expected to meet with key states on Tuesday to discuss a possible extension of the current lockout – which is due to expire on January 10th.
Ahead of these talks, Uwe Janssens, president of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine, called on the government to reconsider its plans.
He said to the Post Rheinischer that tight loops should remain in place, even if the government reaches the target disease rate of 50 per 100,000 people.
“Intensive care physicians strongly advise that no rest should be considered until the frequency value is less than 25 new infections per 100,000 of the week,” Janssens said.
The average infection rate in Germany is 141.2 according to the Robert Koch Institute. However, this number varies widely across the country, with some regions of Saxony recording rates of more than 500.