Oxford–AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine Allocated to some individuals
The Gibraltar Health Authority (GHA) has confirmed that a very small number of doses of the Oxford- AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine were received from the UK a few weeks ago. These doses were allocated only to individuals with multiple medication allergies who were assessed by the clinical teams and considered more suitable to receive this particular vaccine.
A statement continued: “Only a very few individuals have been vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine in Gibraltar. There are no plans currently to bring any more AstraZeneca vaccine to Gibraltar as we have sufficient supply to vaccinate all those who need it clinically.
“The drive and focus of the vaccination programme remains with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Supply of this vaccine from the UK has been sufficient to so far vaccinate all priority age groups to 40 years olds and above. To date 34,600 doses of the Pfizer vaccine have been given with no wastage of any doses. This vaccine has been shown to cause minimal side effects and has been proven to provide greater than 95% immunity for individuals to COVID-19 and protect against a number of COVID variants.”
Minister for Health, Samantha Sacramento, said: “Our incredibly successful vaccination programme has delivered first doses of the Pfizer vaccine to almost two thirds of the population of Gibraltar with little side effects and an impressive level of protection. I feel very optimistic that we can now slowly but safely unlock our community and our health services due to the programme and the level of uptake from the community. We will continue to offer the Pfizer vaccine only, except in very select clinically assessed individuals.”
