According to Ministry of Health officials, Romania has donated over 2 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines and resold over 1.1 million doses. Also, amid a decreased interest in vaccination, the country suspended deliveries from Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca this month, News.ro reported.

“What’s new from last week is that the transport of 300,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine to Vietnam was completed. Thus, we have 1,569,800 donated doses. There are also the 30 doses produced by Johnson & Johnson and the 100,620 Pfizer/BioNTech doses donated to the Republic of Moldova. Another donation to South Korea of 450,000 Moderna vaccines was approved last week, and so far the sale of 1,170,000 vaccine doses to Denmark has been completed, but there are other ongoing governmental steps and arrangements,” Andrei Baciu, Secretary of State in the Ministry of Health, said on Tuesday.

Romania received a total of 18,306,449 COVID-19 vaccine doses by August 23. Of these, approximately 11,595,000 are Pfizer vaccine doses, 2,256,000 Moderna doses, 3,374,000 AstraZeneca and 1,081,300 Johnson & Johnson. This month, the country will receive another 655,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine and over 800,000 doses of the vaccine produced by Johnson & Johnson.

Meanwhile, the Romanians’ interest in vaccination has dropped in the past few months, and the country’s own vaccination campaign has been advancing at a very slow pace over the summer.

According to the official report released on August 24, 13,409 people received a COVID-19 vaccine in Romania in the past 24 hours. In total, almost 9.7 million vaccine doses were administered by August 24 to over 5.19 million people (of which more than 5.07 million were fully vaccinated).

Doctor Valeriu Gheorghita, the coordinator of the national vaccination campaign, said on Tuesday that almost 49% of the eligible population in Bucharest was vaccinated against COVID-19. Cluj county is next, with a share of 45,2%, Agerpres reported.

Twelve counties currently have a vaccination coverage rate above the national average - 30%, while in 27 counties, the rate is between 20% and 29,9%. Meanwhile, only three counties still have vaccination coverage below 20%.

According to local Agerpres, Gheorghita also said that Romania is in the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Delta variant of the virus is about to become dominant in the country. The doctor listed increased mobility, increased interaction between people, and non-compliance with COVID-related public health measures as the main reasons for the increase in new cases.

According to the August 24 official report, 782 new COVID-19 cases were confirmed in Romania in 24 hours, out of 40,125 tests (PCR and rapid tests). In total, more than 1.09 million COVID-19 cases were confirmed in the country since the start of the pandemic.

irina.marica@romania-insider.com

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