Each cabin has an average cost of $ 32,000, Alabi said. Spending on vaccination modules has generated rejection and outrage in the sector of doctors and nurses who describe the action as a waste.
About 156 booths or modules will be built in El Salvador with the aim of implementing the vaccine against COVID-19. This was announced by the Minister of Health, Francisco Alabi.
The total cost of the booths will be $ 5 million, Alabi confirmed during his appearance Tuesday before the special commission investigating the use of funds to fight the pandemic.
According to official statements, each booth will have an estimated cost of $ 32,000. El Salvador does not yet have vaccines for COVID-19. Among the first Latin American countries to start vaccinating their population are Mexico, Costa Rica and Chile.
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Photography / Courtesy / @ObrasPublicasSV.
“We are still working on the installation of 156 vaccination modules, we have 2,000 community health teams, which will provide care to the population in each of these modules,” the Ministry of Health detailed in its official Twitter account.
Alabi also said El Salvador has “a strong vaccination plan and scheme.” He also justified the new investment by alleging that “El Salvador is not going to vaccinate a small percentage, not only will it be given access to 20% of the population, it will be given universal access.”
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The new health strategy has generated several reactions. Social media users have criticized that, for example, first world countries like the United States are vaccinating on tracks, stadiums and other already established infrastructure.
In the medical sector, the cost of the modules has generated rejection and outrage for they qualify the action as a waste, Because the country’s Public Health system has 700 Health Units with adequate infrastructure with cold chain to keep the AstraZeneca vaccine refrigerated with the required temperature.
One of the modules to be installed. Photography / Courtesy / @ObrasPublicasSV
“Health units are equipped with the necessary infrastructure to maintain the cold chain, which is to keep the vaccine refrigerated until the exact time it is applied. In addition, people who go to communities or who go on itinerant routes and that you can not go to the units carry the terms that are regulated and standardized with the requirements of the World Health Organization.And that in this case they can work.They do not need additional infrastructure is not necessary, it is a waste of resources “, said the former Deputy Minister of Health, Eduardo Espinoza.
According to Espinoza, Health had to strengthen and spend on health units, where vaccination sites already exist.
“In my opinion, this (construction) is a propaganda issue for electoral purposes, but it does not respond to the need, the pandemic vaccine simply (construction) should have added to the effort already in the vaccination programs, in which the country already has extensive experience, “he argued.
Eduardo Espinoza added that there are 570 Community Family Health Teams that are located nationwide and that their work is itinerant, which are trained for home vaccination. The former official stressed that it was these health teams, which in the last administration allowed El Salvador to position itself with high vaccination rates, surpassing Costa Rica in immunization rate.
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Without giving further details on when the vaccine against COVID-19 will arrive in El Salvador, Francisco Alabi mentioned that the vaccine to be applied is that of AstraZeneca. That unlike the vaccines of the companies Pfizer and BioNTech that is administered in the United States, European Union, Mexico, Chile and Costa Rica, that require must be stored in a refrigeration to ultra-cold temperatures of -70 ° centigrade.
While the AstraZeneca vaccine that will be applied in the country is easier to store, as it requires the normal temperature of a refrigerator.