Health personnel are getting ready injection syringes with Covid-19 vaccine in 2021 in Copenhagen, Denmark. the nation has now introduced it’ll droop its vaccination program and can evaluation whether or not it is wanted later within the 12 months.
Ole Jensen | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Denmark has turn out to be the primary nation to halt its Covid vaccination program, saying it’s doing so as a result of the virus is now beneath management.
“Spring has arrived, vaccine protection within the Danish inhabitants is excessive, and the epidemic has reversed,” the Danish Health Authority mentioned in a press release Wednesday.
“Therefore, the National Board of Health is now ending the broad vaccination efforts towards Covid-19 for this season,” it mentioned. People is not going to be invited for vaccines from May 15, it mentioned, though everybody will be capable to end their course of vaccination.
Denmark’s Covid vaccination marketing campaign started quickly after Christmas in 2020. Some 4.8 million residents have been vaccinated, the well being authority mentioned, with over 3.6 million individuals receiving a booster shot.
At the identical time, many individuals have been contaminated for the reason that omicron variant turned the dominant pressure of the virus, it mentioned, that means immunity ranges among the many inhabitants are excessive.
“We are in a very good place,” Bolette Soborg, unit supervisor on the National Board of Health commented.
“We have good management of the epidemic, which appears to be subsiding. Admission charges [to hospital] are steady and we additionally anticipate them to fall quickly. Therefore, we’re rounding up the mass vaccination program towards Covid-19.”
Soborg insisted that the general public can nonetheless be vaccinated over the spring and summer time if they need, and that vaccination websites will stay open across the nation.
He added that immunization was nonetheless beneficial to individuals for whom Covid poses a heightened danger, similar to these over the age of 40 and for unvaccinated pregnant ladies. “We additionally proceed to suggest that you just full your began vaccination course,” he mentioned.
Vaccinations more likely to resume
Denmark’s transfer to droop its vaccination program comes because the Covid state of affairs world wide stays combined. Europe and the U.S. have deserted most Covid restrictions, however China remains to be imposing (or contemplating) lockdowns because the virus spreads in main cities like Shanghai and Beijing.
Far from scrapping its vaccination program altogether, nevertheless, the Danish Health and Medicines Authority mentioned there’ll in all probability be a must vaccinate towards Covid-19 once more within the fall because the virus continues to mutate.
New variants have emerged over the course of the pandemic, which is now into its third 12 months. These have eroded the efficacy of the Covid vaccines that had been developed in document time in 2020, though the photographs licensed to be used within the West stay efficient at stopping critical an infection, hospitalization and dying from Covid-19.
With the vaccination program more likely to restart in a couple of months’ time, Denmark’s well being specialists might be taking a look at who must be vaccinated, when the photographs must be given and which vaccines must be used.
The Danish Health and Medicines Authority mentioned it could proceed to observe the event of the epidemic intently, and is able to restart vaccination efforts once more if there’s a must immunize extra goal teams earlier than the autumn.