(ANSA) - PALERMO, 02 APR - About 500 churches open tomorrow in Sicily, not only for Holy Saturday, but also to administer vaccines.
It is the result of the agreement between the Sicilian Episcopal Conference and the Department of Health of the Region which envisages the use of the premises of the parishes of the dioceses of the island as a "population vaccination point".
There are 477 parishes involved, but almost none would have reached the maximum number of adhesions allowed: 100 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines per station to be inoculated to people aged 69 and 79 years.
A minimum of 50 bookings per church is required.
In each center there will be a doctor, a nurse and an administrator to fill in the forms.
The protocol includes the parish exemption declaration from any form of responsibility in case of consequences directly attributable to the health effects of the administration of the vaccine.
"For us pastors of the Churches of Sicily - says the president of the Sicilian Bishops' Conference and archbishop of Catania, Mgr. SalvatoreGristina - the extraordinary day of vaccinations in the parishes proposed by the regional authorities is intended to be a message of hope that we intend to send on the eve of Easter. And, at the time. itself, an opportunity for closeness and disolidarity towards the most fragile people, according to the tradition of the Church, which, following Jesus, doctor of bodies and souls, wants to be a community that promotes the health of people. In fact, this gesture reaches, in particular, the elderly and those who live on the outskirts of our land, start in small villages, where those who have to do prophylaxis are forced to travel for tens of kilometers ".
(HANDLE).