Brazil’s Covid Vaccination Priorities: Elderly, Healthcare Professionals, Indigenous People

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Ministry of Health on Tuesday, December 1st, released the first points of the “preliminary” strategy for vaccinating the population against Covid-19. According to the portfolio, the plan will be divided into four stages.

First stage: healthcare workers; people age 75 or older; people age 60 or over living in long-term institutions (such as nursing homes and psychiatric institutions); and the indigenous population.

Second stage: people between 60 and 74 years old.

Third stage: people with comorbidities who are more likely to suffer more severely from the disease (such as chronic renal and cardiovascular diseases).

Fourth stage: teachers, security and rescue forces, prison staff, and people deprived of their freedom.

The points were introduced after a technical committee meeting in charge of preparing the vaccination plan. Despite the preliminary disclosure, the government states that the immunization plan will only be ready once a vaccine is registered with the National Health Regulatory Agency (ANVISA).

“It is important to note that the plan under discussion is still preliminary and its final confirmation will hinge on the availability, licensing of immunizers, and epidemiological situation of each region,” said the Ministry of Health’s Regulatory Secretary, Arnaldo Medeiros.

Vaccine for 109 million people

As it had pointed out earlier, the federal government does not plan – at least in 2021 – to vaccinate the country’s entire population. In a note released on Tuesday, the Ministry stated that it expects to immunize 109.5 million people next year.

According to the portfolio, the estimate is that vaccination will occur “in two doses, as planned by the vaccine schemes of immunizers already guaranteed by the Ministry of Health – Fiocruz/AstraZeneca and through the Covax Facility alliance”.

The so-called “preliminary strategy definitions” do not include the CoronaVac vaccine, from the Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac, which is in its final trial phase and is expected to be distributed in Brazil. The São Paulo government has signed an agreement for the purchase of 46 million doses and for the transfer of technology to the Butantan Institute.

Federal plan vaccines

The Ministry of Health recalled that the government has currently guaranteed 142.9 million vaccine doses through Fiocruz/AstraZeneca (100.4 million) and Covax Facility (42.5 million) agreements; however, no vaccine has yet been registered with ANVISA.

With no mention of the CoronaVac, the government also pointed out that “last month, the Ministry of Health held meetings with representatives of Pfizer BioNTech, Moderna, India’s Bharat Biotech (Covaxin) and Russia’s Gamaleya Institute (Sputnik V), which also have vaccines in advanced stages of clinical research, for a technical and logistic approach”.

Earlier on Tuesday, Secretary Arnaldo Medeiros said that the vaccination plan will aim to adopt immunizers that are thermostable, i.e. that do not need very low storage temperatures, as occurs with the vaccines developed by Pfizer and Moderna.

Source: G1