Spain has received its first 35,700 doses of the Moderna Covid-19 vaccine, several weeks into its vaccination campaign, which until now has made exclusive use of the Pfizer-BioNTech inoculation. In total, the country is due to receive 600,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine before the end of the month of February.
According to Spain’s Health Minister Salvador Illa, speaking after a Cabinet meeting, the quantities received will gradually rise, with 50,000 due to arrive in two weeks’ time, another 127,000 in a month, and 383,000 more in the third week of next month.
The first doses arrived last Tuesday in 357 boxes on board a truck from Belgium, and were taken to a Health Ministry storage unit in the central area of Spain.
The country is currently receiving 350,000 doses a week of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Illa also pointed to the positive news that the AstraZeneca laboratory in the United Kingdom has also requested authorisation from the European Medicines Agency to distribute its Covid vaccine in the European Union.
The arrival of the new vaccines will not mean significant changes to the immunisation plan, which is currently focusing on seniors in residences and their carers, as well as front-line health workers.
Judge decides to vaccinate
Meanwhile, for the first time in Spain a judge has obliged an incapacitated resident of a senior home to be vaccinated against Covid-19, despite the opposition of her daughter. A court in Santiago de Compostela, in the northwestern region of Galicia, took the decision in record time after receiving the request from the DomusVi San Lázaro senior home on Friday evening. By Saturday evening the judge had ruled in favour and gave instructions for the 84-year-old woman to be immunized.
The judge found that the health of the woman should prevail over the opinion of her daughter, and despite the Covid vaccinations being voluntary in Spain. “Is it urgent to vaccinate a senior during the pandemic? The infection rates suggest it is,” the judge said. “It is well known that there is a high number of deaths and it was urgent to protect her. There are few more urgent things than saving a life.”
According to Spain’s Institute for the Elderly and Social Services (Imserso), residences from all over the country have turned to the courts for permission to immunise incapacitated seniors despite the opposition of their families.
In this case in Galicia, the daughter of the woman in question opposed the vaccination on fears of an adverse reaction to the vaccine and due to the “responsibility of having to make a decision for another person.”