Fourth dose of the Covid vaccines to be given from 26th September

Three million people in Spain are set to benefit from a fourth dose of the Covid vaccine from Monday 26th September, all of them either over the age of 80 or residents of care homes. After that, the government announced, that it will be the turn of the 12 million people, at least, who are over the age of 60.

So far, only 350,000 people in Spain have received a fourth dose and that is because they are particularly vulnerable, for example undergoing cancer treatment, transplant patients, or people over 40 who have Downs Syndrome.

This new campaign will be slightly different, because the fourth dose will be administered in care homes or health centres rather than in vaccine centres specifically set up for this purpose.

The vaccines will also be different this time round as they have been modified to combat the Omicron variants. The first supplies arrived in Spain on Thursday and will be distributed to the regional health authorities next week.

Although in July, Spain registered an incidence of Covid-19 of 1,225 cases for every 100,000 inhabitants over the age of 60 (the only group which has been monitored since March), which was quite high, the Ministry of Health decided to delay the extra doses because it wanted to use the new Spanish-produced Hipra vaccine.

However, this is still under review and has not yet received the green light from the EMA so it was decided not to wait any longer.

The Ministry of Health also announced this week that the flu vaccine campaign will begin on 17th October, “depending on availability and epidemiological circumstances of the different regions”.