Chamber of Doctors: the vaccination process of Hungarian healthcare professionals is chaotic

The Hungarian Chamber of Doctors (Magyar Orvosi Kamara, MOK) informed that the vaccination process of healthcare professionals is chaotic and uncoordinated – those who receive the vaccine first are not rationally chosen, and it is complicated to apply.

According to Telex, secretary of the Hungarian Chamber of Doctors, Tamás Svéd informed on their website about the start of the vaccination process of healthcare professionals. For example, a mother that stays home with a baby, a retired professor, and administrative co-workers belong to the group of people that received the coronavirus vaccine in the first round.

Vaccination takes place in 25 different areas in the country, and the plan is to vaccinate firstly 4500 people and secondly 35 000 people.

“It is sad that the safety and reliability of planning and organising, the lobbying power of Hungary in getting the vaccines only allows this, about 40 000 vaccines for 140 000 healthcare professionals and 10 million residents.”, says Svéd.

The vaccines that arrived in Hungary so far would allow vaccinating about 80 000 people, but according to Svéd, they do not trust that enough vaccines for the second dose will arrive in time, so they keep half of the amount for that purpose. With that, however, there is a risk that the vaccines that would need to be used in a couple of days go to waste.

In the meantime, the second and third shipments of vaccines arrived in Hungary, but due to the lack of a priority system, the distribution of these is somewhat questionable.

Instead of those who work with Covid patients, with not tested patients, emergency surgery workers, and those who work under risk of aerosol, people who received vaccines in the first round included a mother that stays home with a baby, a retired professor and several administrative co-workers.

According to Svéd, the vaccine centres started vaccinating all their employees first – including their administrative workers.

The smaller centres did not receive a fixed schedule for the vaccination process, but employees have to apply if they want to be vaccinated. The application website, however, is not always working: the spots are quickly taken, and the hotlines are not answering due to the great number of calls.

On the other hand, the situation is even more chaotic and uncoordinated in the capital. The schedule is not the same for all vaccination centres and a dentist who works in public practice, for example, has been calling all of the vaccine centres in Budapest, and none of them thought the doctor should be assigned to them.

Even though MOK tries to encourage people to get vaccinated, the frustration it takes is not helping at all.

Source: Telex