Critical infrastructure staff get AstraZeneca vaccines in National Plan Phase 3

Bulgaria's national COVID-19 vaccination plan on Sunday went into its third phase, which covers critical public infrastructure employees, including staff of the BB-NCIPD Ltd. company who receive, store and distribute the vaccines.

Bulgarian Drug Agency (BDA) Executive Director Bogdan Kirilov said that members of the election commissions will be included in the vaccination drive as well, with doses available for all of them wishing to be inoculated so as to ensure safe balloting at the April 4 parliamentary elections.

The first 28,800 doses of the Oxford University/AstraZeneca vaccine against COVID-19 arrived in Bulgaria on Saturday evening.

Kirilov told a news briefing immediately after delivery was taken that three more shipments of the same vaccine are expected in February, with the total adding up to 260,000 doses. The BDA head noted that the distribution of the vaccines will start next week, and the National Vaccination Task Force will meet on Monday to discuss the launch of the vaccination using the AstraZeneca product.

He explained that the second dose of this vaccine can be administers between 4 and 12 weeks after the first one, which is why an option will be explored to use all doses available instead of reserving half for the second inoculation.