Coronavirus: 1735 Johnson & Johnson shots booked

More than 1700 Johnson & Johnson single dose Covid-19 vaccines were booked through the vaccination portal on Friday, the first day they were made available here.

The J&J shots were among a total of 8355 appointments booked within 90 minutes of the vaccination portal opening up for people aged 45 and 46 at 7.30 am.

A total of 13,830 vaccines were made available on the portal for the specific age group. The portal remains open until 8.00 pm.

The health ministry said that by 9.00 am, a total of 1214 appointments were made for AstraZeneca vaccines, 5413 for Pfizer and 1735 for Johnson & Johnson. Cyprus has taken delivery of 2400 J&J vaccines so far, and all were made available on the portal today, the Cyprus News Agency reported.

Yesterday, a total of 10,150 of the 13,9000 slots made available were taken up.

In a move to accelerate vaccination coverage the health ministry announced on Thursday that it has contacted the association of personal doctors inviting them to express interest in vaccinating their patients.

“Specifically, the Ministry of Health will supply Personal Doctors who will express interest, with the necessary quantity of AstraZeneca vaccines. The vaccines will be administered to beneficiaries aged 30 and over who wish to be vaccinated, according to a schedule prepared by the doctors themselves,” it said.

Due to the delivery and storage and conditions required for AstraZeneca, only this specific vaccine will be administered at the medical centres of the Personal Doctors who will express interest.

But the president of the association of personal doctors Andreas  Polinikis told CyBC on Friday he did not anticipate much interest from members who are already hard pressed with their duties.

He said doctors were busy monitoring patients with coronavirus should they require hospitalisation and were already spending a lot of time on ‘secretarial’ duties booking appointments on the vaccination portal for their patients.

Head of the pharmacists association Eleni Piera Isseyek said local pharmacists could help the vaccination process.