Buenos Aires starts vaccinating people over age 50

Buenos Aires, Jun 8 (EFE).- The city of Buenos Aires on Tuesday began the process of vaccinating all residents over age 50 by allowing interested persons to register and request an appointment to get the first dose of the two-dose series, Buenos Aires Health Minister Fernan Quiros said.

“We’re continuing to expand the age range to have access to vaccination against Covid-19. Starting now, people over age 50 can register to receive an appointment (to get) the first dose of the vaccine,” the minister said on his Twitter account, where he provided a link to access the Web site where people may sign up for the jab.

Quiros held a press conference to explain the procedure and emphasized that the aim of the capital authorities is “to intensify vaccination of all people over age 50 who live in the city without regard for their situation or profession.”

According to the latest official figures, 1.82 million doses of the vaccine are available in the Argentine capital and so far the vaccine has been divided up among healthcare and essential personnel, people who are at greater risk of becoming infected and those over age 60. A total of 999,967 people have received at least one dose and 283,884 have received both doses needed to provide the maximum protection against the sometimes deadly disease.

For months, Argentina has been suffering through a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic, during which record numbers of infections and deaths have occurred, although in some districts, including the capital, the rising trend is now beginning to slacken and ministry figures show that the rate of infections has begun to decline.

“The decline this week intensified the decline that we had started to have,” Quiros said, although he added that “it’s still not enough.”

Authorities are evaluating the number of infections and the impact they are having on intensive care unit bed occupancy, where they hope that declining numbers of infections will be correlated with a decline in the number of ICU patients.

“We’re hoping that this week and next the ICU bed occupancy curve will start to fall,” the minister said.

Argentina on Monday registered 22,195 newly confirmed Covid-19 cases, bringing the country’s total infection count since the pandemic began to 3,977,634, while the official number of deaths rose to 81,946 with 733 new fatalities reported in the past 24 hours.

EFE