Europe is vaccinating against the corona virus. Whole europe? No. The campaign is making little headway in the east. In Bulgaria in particular, hardly anyone wants to be vaccinated anymore. Many vaccine doses are about to expire.
Bulgaria and vaccination are not working. The vaccination progress is barely making any headway. While countries like Malta, Denmark or the Netherlands are pushing the tube and the vaccination rate is high, Bulgaria is at the bottom of the statistics in a European comparison. According to “Our World in Data”, just 15 percent of the population received at least one vaccine dose, and almost 13 percent are completely immunized. It is not foreseeable that the poor country in the south-east of the EU will soon ignite the turbo. However, this is not due to a lack of vaccine – on the contrary. Many doses threaten to expire.
Shortly before the end of the year, the Bulgarian Minister of Health Kostadin Angelov had himself vaccinated against the corona virus in front of the camera. It should be the starting shot of the campaign to remove the vaccination reservations from the population. However, the promotional campaign did not really spark off. The vaccination skepticism in the country is great.
Bulgaria has been shaken by the pandemic. More than 423,000 corona cases have been counted among the 7 million inhabitants so far. And according to calculations by John Hopkins University, the country has the highest proportion of so-called casualties in the EU. This puts the number of infected people in relation to the deceased and is therefore 4 percent in Bulgaria.
First no vaccine, then too much vaccine
Bulgaria had teething problems. At first it didn’t work out with the organization, then the vaccine was missing. The country on the Black Sea has now solved this problem. There is enough vaccine. But the Bulgarians shy away from the injection. Cristina Florescu from Suceava told Bloomberg: “I am still skeptical about vaccinations because I have doubts about their safety and long-term side effects”. The 37-year-old was already struggling with side effects after being infected with corona and she did not want to expose herself to any other substances.
Her attitude is not the exception, but the rule. According to one, 60 percent of the population rejects the vaccination. And health professionals worry. The delta variant will trigger a new wave by the end of September, unless another variant is faster, said senior health inspector Angel Kuntchew to the online portal “Euractiv” in a vaccination appeal. The government is also relying on a new body to find ways to rid Bulgarians of their vaccination fatigue. The “social council” includes not only experts and religious representatives, but also journalists and celebrities.
Nobody wants to be vaccinated anymore
The numbers speak for themselves. In April around 25,000 Bulgarians rolled up their sleeves every day, in June only 8,000. The result: Thousands of vaccine doses threaten to expire. In July alone the shelf life of 20,000 cans expires, according to “Bloomberg”. The government is desperately looking for solutions. A part, according to the plan, is to be donated to neighboring countries. Other doses could be used to boost tourism in the country. That would at least be an idea of the tourism experts. Polina Karastoyanova, managing director of the National Tourism Association, told the industry service: “Since Bulgaria and thus all of us have paid our taxes for these doses, we suggest using them to stimulate vaccination tourism”.
Bulgaria is not the only country struggling to get rid of the vaccination doses. In Romania, too, the willingness to vaccinate is low, the number of vaccinations is falling rapidly. Although anyone who wants has been able to get vaccinated there since mid-March, just a quarter of Romanians have made use of it. In June orders were therefore cut from the planned 7 million cans to 2.6 million. In doing so, the country wanted to minimize the risk that the active ingredient would have to be thrown away. 35,000 cans of the Astrazeneca vaccine have already ended up in the garbage, writes the “Spiegel” in relation to local media. Denmark bought 1.1 million cans from the country. Denmark is one of the European front runners with its vaccination rate.
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