Private health care workers being left behind in Vaccination Strategy

SPAIN is reported to be the only European country where there are private health professionals who still have not been vaccinated against Covid-19.

Despite the promise of the health councils of the autonomous regions of Spain that there would be no discrimination in the supply of vaccines against Covid-19 to all health care professionals, the Spanish Private Health Alliance (ASPE) has reported worrying delays in some territories.
The Covid-19 Vaccination Strategy of the Ministry of Health, states that health and social-health groups are within risk groups and as such should be given preferential access to vaccination services.
However, many regions have not yet begun to immunize health workers in the private sector.
The president of ASPE, Carlos Rus, demanded “equal treatment for all health professionals who are risking their lives in this pandemic, whether they are working in a public or private health centre ”.
The private health care sector serves more than 12 million patients, so “for the safety of the whole of society it is essential to speed up immunization of all health care professionals in the country, without exceptions,” insisted Rus.
According to a report in National Spanish daily, 20 minutos, in the Canary Islands, vaccination, although expected within days, has not begun for frontline health workers (ICU, ER, COVID floors and microbiology) in the private sector.
Valencia is in a similar situation, vaccines have reached a few private hospitals this week, but complaints have been made to the health department regarding their “questionable distribution criteria”.
The Basque Country has said that once public health care professionals are vaccinated, it will be the turn of the private sector, while in Galicia, they have said that not as many health care professionals will receive vaccines in the private sector.
Castilla y Leon has not started either, Navarra has only got around to 250 out of 1,800 private health care workers.
Meanwhile in La Rioja, they have already been vaccinated, and in Murcia and Madrid they have all received the first dose. The Balearic Islands have started although the protocol is unclear. In Aragon, Andalucia and Cataluña vaccination is being carried out and is due to be administered to both public and private health care staff simultaneously.

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