It makes sense to have a central vaccination solution, says a health expert.
When a vaccine against coronavirus arrives, vulnerable Danes in the risk groups as well as health personnel must first pass a white test center to be vaccinated.
This is how it now sounds from Minister of Health Magnus Heunicke (S), after a day of criticism from several parties over a lack of Danish vaccine strategy.
We do not want to risk that doses are wasted, as we want to have vaccinated as many as possible, as quickly as possible. Voluntary and free for the individual citizen. That is why we want central control, and the vaccinations will therefore take place through Testcenter Danmark in the regions, says the Minister of Health to TV 2.
So far, the white tents are most of all associated with having a corona test, but that will change when a vaccine is approved for use in the EU and Denmark.
On Tuesday, Magnus Heunicke sat at the end of the table at a 45-minute briefing meeting with the Folketing’s health rapporteurs, where they were updated on Denmark’s future strategy. The Minister could not come up with a ready-made plan.
Special storage for vaccines
However, he estimates to TV 2 that Denmark will initially receive between 50,000 and 100,000 vaccines.
– And then we will receive more a few weeks later. Some of the vaccines need to be stored under special conditions. We have also bought in for them, and we are ready to execute them, the Minister of Health assures.
According to Jan Pravsgaard, professor at the Department of Immunology and Microbiology at the University of Copenhagen, it makes good sense to centralize the vaccinations in the white test tents.
– When preparing the vaccines, each ampoule is valid for 10 people. So you want to make sure that there are actually 10 people ready, so we do not waste a lot of the ampoules we buy at home, he says to TV 2.
He emphasizes that the most important thing is to have a good infrastructure in place:
– So we can store the vaccines cold and have them transported to the tents. And then you have to have some kind of booking system so that the right people come at the right times.
