Fabian Debesa
03/13/2021 6:01 AM
Clarín.com
Society
Updated 03/13/2021 11:55 AM
The disproportion is eloquent and shows that older adults - with or without previous illnesses -
remain in a high-risk zone
in the fight against Covid-19.
In the province of Buenos Aires, 84% of the virus victims were over 60 years old.
The vaccines applied by the Government since the inoculation program began reached only 9.1% of older Buenos Aires residents who enrolled in the application that grants shifts and, however, the outlook for this age group is more encouraging than in the capital.
Put in numbers: Buenos Aires registers - according to data from the Covid Situation Room - 26,900 deaths attributed to the plague that arrived a year ago and upset the life of the entire planet.
Of these, 23,600 had been born before 1960.
The provincial government reported that, up to this Thursday, March 11, 4.2 million citizens had registered on the virtual site to obtain a turn and of that total, more than 1,800,000 six decades of life have passed.
How many doses were applied among the men and women who constitute the range of greatest vulnerability?
164,200
, according to official reports.
In a radio interview, Axel Kicillof admitted that “among those over 70, we have registered 750,000 and we apply more than 120,000.
It represents 15% of those registered voluntarily ”.
So far, the provincial health system has administered 883,000 doses.
Some 285,000 came to the health system, 150,000 to teachers and the rest went to the elderly.
In the city of Buenos Aires, those over 70 years of age have yet to complete the vaccination of those over 80 years of age to qualify those over 70 and those over 60, who
in total are more than half a million people
( 250,000 +70 and 275,000 +60).
So far, the Rodríguez Larreta administration has vaccinated only a third of the more than 150,000 people over 80 years of age.
For this reason, 10 days ago the Buenos Aires Minister of Health, Fernán Quirós, questioned that the dose distribution is made by the total population of each district and not by how many of its inhabitants are in risk groups.
Already in December, when the first Sputnik V arrived to vaccinate health personnel,
Clarín
had indicated that
this criterion generated disparities
: Province had received doses to vaccinate 85% of doctors and nurses and Capital, 30%.
But then there were no proposals from the Buenos Aires administration against this distribution.
Age pyramid
At the same time, hundreds of photos of young people in Buenos Aires vaccinations are replicated and almost at the same time, as well as complaints on the networks due to
delays in the appointment of a shift
for citizens who are at the top of the age pyramid, also in the province.
The application that Salud designed to set the will to be vaccinated provides a statement where the citizen informs if they are health personnel or teachers, their age and if they have risk diseases.
The campaign began with agents working in hospitals and in healthcare.
It then spread to nursing homes and when Sputnik V's scientific studies were validated in The Lancet, they also began vaccinating people over 70 (as of mid-February).
But the demand turned out to be more voluminous than the supply.
And the arrival of the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine
accentuated the delay among the largest
: it is that this formulation is not approved for people over 60 years of age.
Then, almost 400,000 vials were given to the group between 20 and 59 years old, as long as they were "health personnel" or "teachers."
“The decision made around the world to include health personnel, including administrative staff and those who work in call centers, was replicated here.
It was an epidemiological determination
, ”argued Kicillof.
But there was also a leak in the shift system: it is that
among teachers it is not specified whether they work in primary, secondary or tertiary level
.
University students are also receiving their applications, although more than 95% of the classrooms in the cloisters are empty and without face-to-face activity.
The delay in the immunization of the most vulnerable sector of the population
worries experts
.
“At the country level, 84% of the deceased are over 60. 60,000 to 70,000 people are being vaccinated per day, including health and essential personnel.
The rhythm would have to be doubled in order to complete that population strip at the beginning of winter, ”said the infectologist Eduardo López, from the Gutiérrez Hospital Medicine department and member of the team that advises the national government.
Now, the national authorities have announced that the provision of another 3 million vaccines has been agreed.
Almost half would arrive in Buenos Aires.
“By vaccinating 50,000 per day, in a month we can complete 1.5 million Buenos Aires.
And in a short time we would have covered the age group over 70 ”, was the calculation made by Kicillof.
The whole mechanism should work like a Swiss watch.
Although some breakdowns are already noticed.
The Deputy Minister of Health, Nicolás Kreplak acknowledged that this week there was a day in which almost 12,000 people "did not show up for the shift."
This situation also delays the procedure.
“We are trying to perfect a theme that is presenteeism, because we are doing 60,000 shifts per day these days, but there are times when not all of them arrive.
So we ended up applying 49,000 doses, for example, this Wednesday, "said Kreplak on a Buenos Aires radio.
On Thursday, however, the Province exceeded the record and completed the process in more than 58,179 people.
The data worries the authorities because it also complicates the procedure: each vial with the vaccine has five doses, which due to their maintenance logistics, must be applied as soon as possible, once the vial is thawed.
Each absence in the shifts forces the organizers of the campaign to rearm the groups.
La Plata. Correspondent
AS
Look also
Sputnik V's message to Mirtha Legrand for receiving the coronavirus vaccine: "Now you are protected"
Coronavirus in Argentina: new risk factors are added to vaccinate people between 18 and 59 years old