Coronavirus: vaccine portal to reopen Friday for 35-36 age group

After crashing in the morning and remaining down all day, the health ministry announced on Thursday night that vaccine portal would come back online on Friday, May 7 at 7.30am and stay open until 8pm for people aged 35 to 36.

As for the 33-34 age group, who initially were supposed to access the portal on Friday, the ministry said the appointments date has had to be rescheduled; the precise appointments date for this age bracket would be announced on Friday.

Despite recent upgrades, the vaccination portal failed to launch on Thursday due to a technical problem and the system wad down throughout the day, with authorities saying it should be back online on Friday morning.

The portal was due to open at 7.30 am for the age group of 35 to 36.

Deputy minister for innovation Kyriakos Kokkinos told CyBC radio that there was a technical problem which the provider – the IT company in charge of the Gesy portal – and the deputy ministry were working to fix.

“This was not due to an overload. The portal did not open,” Kokkinos said.

On at least two occasions in the past, the portal had crashed because of an overload as multiple users tried to gain access in order to book an appointment for the same person. This was changed, and as from today, only one user per person can access the portal at any time.

According to the health ministry, the total number of Covid-19 vaccine doses administered until Tuesday was 307,698; 31.9 per cent (235,919 people) were vaccinated with the first dose of licensed vaccines, while 9.9 per cent (71,779 people) completed their vaccinations.

It is expected that by the end of June more than 60 per cent of the population will be covered.

“The results of vaccinations have begun to be seen in Cyprus, with a dramatic reduction in hospital admissions for the elderly,” the ministry stated.

More than 80 per cent (84.8 per cent) of people aged 80 and over have received at least the first jab, while for the age group from 70 to 79 years the vaccination coverage is 80.5 per cent.

An increase has also been recorded for the age group from 60 to 69, with the coverage rate reaching 58.4 per cent.