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Making progress
Update on COVID-19 vaccine rollout globally and in Australia .
By Conor Burke
As the COVID-19 vaccine is rolled out across aged care homes nationwide there have been encouraging signs from overseas as to the various vaccines ’ ability to reduce infection .
In the US , as of February , 1,315,000 people had been infected across 31,000 aged care homes , with at least 172,000 deaths , yet there has been a significant drop in cases .
As reported by The New York Times , from late December to February new cases of the virus dropped by over 80 per cent , almost double the drop seen in the general population , and new cases in nursing homes are at their lowest point since May last year .
While in the UK , people over 80 who had been vaccinated with one dose of either the Pfizer or Oxford / AstraZeneca jab had more than 80 per cent protection against hospital admission , while the Pfizer jab was 85 per cent effective at preventing death from COVID-19 .
Around 95 per cent of care home residents have been vaccinated , with all
2 | nursingreview . com . au other areas of the UK over 93 per cent . Research from the British Medical
Journal found that in the three weeks to 14 February , deaths in care homes fell by 62 per cent , the lowest level since the end of October last year .
Overall , the number of deaths in the 85 and over age group has fallen by 45 per cent .
These figures have not as yet been directly attributed to the vaccination program , but experts say that signs are encouraging .
Chris Whitty , the UK ’ s chief medical adviser , said : “ The earliest indications would imply there is some effect . But I think it ’ s too early to put a number on that . We would expect to see some evidence that is strong enough to put into the public domain in the next few weeks .”
ASTRAZENECA VACCINE UNDER CLOUD A number of European nations paused the rollout of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine after some reports of adverse side effects .
Germany , Italy , France and Spain were among a host of countries to suspend their COVID-19 vaccine rollouts while they investigated reports of blood clotting
“ There is no place for antivaccination messages in professional health practice .
in patients who had been vaccinated , however the World Health Organization ( WHO ) urged nations to reconsider .
“ There is no evidence that the incidents are caused by the vaccine and it is important that vaccination campaigns continue so that we can save lives and stem severe disease from the virus ,” WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier said .
Senior members of the government , including Prime Minister Scott Morrison , Health Minister Greg Hunt and Treasurer Josh Frydenberg , were briefed on the vaccine rollout .
Frydenberg reiterated that WHO had said there was “ no evidence ” that the AstraZeneca vaccine had caused the blood clots .
“ In the case of the United Kingdom , they have already distributed more than 12 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine , and they haven ’ t seen those trends or patterns across their community ,” he told ABC RN .
“ It is still the government ’ s intention to roll it out , as we ’ ve said .”