Health and communities plan to inject the third dose to people with cancer and nursing homes | society

The third dose of the covid vaccine is aimed at new groups. The Ministry of Health and the communities will propose this Thursday to the Public Health Commission to inject an additional dose of the anti-coronavirus drug to people on hemodialysis, patients undergoing cancer treatment, individuals over 40 with Down syndrome and the elderly in residences. In the absence of approval in the commission that brings together Health with all the regional directors general of public health, the communities have given this Wednesday to the Interterritorial Council the endorsement to extend the third dose to these groups.

The Minister of Health, Carolina Darias, explained this Wednesday after the Interterritorial Council that the Vaccine Report has made a proposal that includes administering the additional dose to group 7 of the Vaccination Strategy and, from 4 October, to the elderly living in residences. The Commission will have to approve it, in any case, this Thursday.

Initially, the additional injection against covid is already reaching the group of immunocompromised people – in total, there are about 100,000, among people who have received transplants, patients with lymphoma and multiple sclerosis, among other diseases. Catalonia, for example, announced this Wednesday that it has already administered 2,829 punctures between 9 and 14 September. In this group of people, their immune system is weakened and the response made by the defensive army of their body is insufficient to what is considered a complete guideline for the rest of the population.

With the inclusion of the planned new groups, communities are trying to protect the most vulnerable population and those most at risk of becoming seriously ill or dying from covid. Darias has confirmed that the communities and Health will study, in the case of the elderly living in residences, the possibility of administering the additional dose now or accompanying it with the injection of the flu vaccine, which is usually inoculated during the autumn.

Among experts, however, there is much debate about the appropriateness of administering a third dose. Alberto Infante, Professor Emeritus of International Health at the National School of Health of the Carlos III Institute of Health, warns that it is not yet known how long cellular immunity lasts and is committed to giving doses to third world countries with low rates of vaccination before administering a third dose in rich countries: “We are also not sure what effect the third dose has on people of this nature,” he postulates.