ROME (AP) – Italy’s main teachers’ union complain about plans for educators under 55 to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine instead of injections it believes offer better protection, evidence that lobby groups are vying for specific shots like the virus and its variants spread across Europe.
The CISL School union said in a statement on Monday that it wanted a meeting with the Italian government’s scientific committee. It complained it had not been consulted about the decision to initiate teacher vaccination ahead of schedule, with some of the first 250,000 AstraZeneca doses coming in over the weekend.
The Italian government revised its vaccination plans last week after Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna cut vaccine deliveries and the Italian pharmaceutical agency gave ‘preferential use’ for AstraZeneca shots for people 18 to 55 years old. The government is now directing its Pfizer and Moderna shots to inoculate people over the age of 80 while designating the AstraZeneca shots for younger, high-risk workers.
Interim analysis of late stage human trials showed that the AstraZeneca vaccine was 70.4% effective in preventing symptomatic COVID-19 after two doses. Pfizer and Moderna reported preliminary results from late-stage studies that found their vaccines to be nearly 95% effective.
Over the weekend, South Africa suspended plans to vaccinate its primary care health workers at AstraZeneca after a small clinical trial suggested that it is ineffective in preventing mild to moderate disease of the variant that is dominant in the country.
To date, Italy has identified one person who tested positive with the variant from South Africa who arrived by flight from the continent, although more cases of the variants have been identified in Britain and Brazil. But on Monday, the Austrian government warned against traveling to the province of Tyrol, which borders northern Italy, after 293 infections of the variant identified in South Africa were confirmed there.
Northern Italy has been the hardest hit part of the country since the first locally transmitted case was confirmed on Feb. 21 in Lombardy, becoming Europe’s one-time epicenter. While infections across the country have remained stable for several weeks – around 8,000 new confirmed cases were reported Monday and 307 new deaths – the northern regions continue to see the highest rates of infections and deaths. With more than 90,000 dead, Italy has the second highest confirmed COVID-19 death toll in Europe after Great Britain.
The union said school officials were questioning whether to accept the AstraZeneca vaccine, given the “claimed lower vaccination coverage compared to the more effective Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.”
The virus tsar of Italy, Domenico Arcuri, has defended the decision to target the AstraZeneca vaccines at younger workers, saying that the Italian campaign’s dual purpose is to reduce overall mortality among the elderly most at risk of fatal complications, and to the spread of the virus among younger people.
“We have a new weapon that will allow us to strengthen the categories for vaccination,” Arcuri told reporters Friday.
Originally, Italy’s National Vaccine Plan prioritized health workers and nursing home residents with the first doses of vaccines coming in, followed by those over the age of 80.
But the new “preferential use” designation for AstraZeneca recordings means that a parallel campaign is starting this week for among 55 teachers, law enforcement personnel, armed forces, inmates and prison officials, as well as key community workers and residents.
Italy has administered more than 2.5 million doses to date. On Monday, the first doses for people over 80 years of age who do not live in nursing homes started in local hospitals in Rome.
“I have seven grandchildren waiting for a hug,” said a pleased Abramo Abrusca when he got his Pfizer injection.