Stop vaccine shopping, hopping

THE ARRIVAL of more than 300,000 Pfizer covid19 vaccine doses from the US compels the Government to turn its attention to boosting the vaccine take-up rate.

Additionally, the confirmed presence of the highly infectious delta variant means the time has come to bite the bullet in relation to mandatory vaccination or, at the very least measures that will impel people to get vaccinated if they want access to certain facilities and agencies.

The common good must come before “personal choice.”

The State must take urgent and meaningful steps to ensure more people get jabbed.

In relation to this first US shipment, the Government must hold to its promise that the Pfizer vaccine will be used for secondary schoolchildren, given the vaccine’s approval for that age bracket.

In terms of the general population, the State might be tempted to wait and see if more people will want the latest jabs. But with over 100,000 students first in line, the initial supply of Pfizer is clearly encumbered.

With looming expiry dates, a manifest propensity for “vaccine shopping” and pockets of resistance evident in the population, a bolder approach is needed if we are to hold on to the chance to reopen our economy and avoid its complete collapse.

Unfortunately, even before the confirmed delta cases, mistakes were made.

Minister of Health Terrence Deyalsingh on Wednesday said his ministry had been preparing for delta for a while now.

“I have been telling people for a month now to get ready,” Mr Deyalsingh said.

Yet mere weeks ago, the ministry’s epidemiologist Dr Avery Hinds was saying there was no need to adjust measures to deal with the arrival of delta.

“The pre-existing strategies hold,” Dr Hinds said when questioned by the media on June 28.

If the State has been sending mixed signals to the public, the public has been sending mixed signals to the State.

That the highly variable take-up rate has to do with vaccine shopping seems clear, given the rush for AstraZeneca at certain facilities.

However, there is also vaccine hopping. Some people are apparently taking a first dose of one type of vaccine available at that time, then getting in line for a dose of their preferred type.

This practice undermines the entire effort and is wasteful: some mixtures of vaccines are not recommended (or approved) and the doses that are being superseded or taken up in this way could have protected someone else.

Puzzlingly, the State is now assuring that records of vaccinations are being kept, while at the same time urging people to be honest. Is there a data entry lag affecting officials’ ability to weed out vaccine-hoppers?

Let’s really be honest: the State wouldn’t have to appeal for honesty if its systems were working as they should.