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Federal officials today explained how they plan to distribute millions of doses of the COVID-19 vaccine in the coming weeks as Ottawa launches its mass inoculation campaign.
The initial supply of the doses will be limited – only three million Canadians are expected to receive a dose in the first three months of 2021. Millions more doses are expected to arrive as the supply chain stabilizes.
One of the main challenges facing the immunization effort is the distribution of vaccines that need to be stored at very low temperatures, well below what a standard commercial refrigerator can offer.
The Pfizer product, which is expected to get the green light from Health Canada as early as this month, must be kept at around -80 degrees Celsius to remain stable. The Moderna product, another vaccine that uses revolutionary messenger RNA (mRNA) technology, must be kept at -20 degrees Celsius.
Maj. Gen. Dany Fortin, a former NATO commander in Iraq, is in charge of logistics and vaccination operations at a new National Operations Center at the Public Health Agency of Canada. As the country faces unprecedented “logistical complexities”, he said, the military and its partners will be ready to distribute the vaccines as soon as they are approved in Canada.
He said the National Operations Center is not waiting for Health Canada’s approval to begin preparations. The Pfizer product will be delivered by that company directly to provincial and territorial distribution points as early as the end of the month.
The federal government has already provided the required cold storage for this product. All provinces have indicated where Pfizer-specific refrigerators should be located and 14 distribution points nationwide will be ready to receive the vaccine starting December 14, Fortin said.
Eventually, there will be 205 “trouble spots” across the country where health workers can administer the vaccine, the general said. It will be up to the provinces and territories to specify where and when individual Canadians will be vaccinated.
Fortin said at least one “dead end” has been run so far, with more planned in the coming days, to ensure things run smoothly once this vaccine reaches our shores from manufacturing centers in the US and beyond. abroad. These hands-on tests will ensure that officials are comfortable with what Fortin called the “unique requirements” of this vaccine.
Fortin said it is actively planning multiple worst-case scenarios, such as bad weather, cyberattacks and fires in distribution centers.
“We are executing a nationwide approach. The scale, scale and scale of this problem is unprecedented and there are a number of factors at play,” he said. “I like the idea of being ready before Christmas, so we’re sure to be ready when it arrives in January.”
The general said his team is in daily contact with Pfizer and the company is “comfortable” with the plan Canada has come up with. Pfizer said it will not ship the product to a country that is not ready to receive such a temperature-sensitive vaccine.
Dr. Supriya Sharma, chief medical consultant for Health Canada, said Thursday that Pfizer’s regulatory review of the vaccine is “going very well” and its department has “most of the information” it needs from the company to certify. which is safe and effective.
In an interview with CBC’s Power and politics, Sharma said final approval could come in the next 7-10 days. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration will meet on December 10 to decide on an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for that shot, and Sharma said Canada is following a similar timeline.
Canada has ordered Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech for 20 million doses of the two-dose vaccine, with options for millions more in the months to follow.
The company reported that its vaccine was 95% effective in preventing COVID-19 among clinical trial participants who had no evidence of prior infection.
Prepare for the worst
The Moderna vaccine, which is expected to warrant regulatory approvals after Pfizer’s product, will be imported into Canada by the federal government, largely through private shipping companies. Ottawa in turn will divide the product by provinces and territories.
The government is now finalizing “fine-mile” contracts with logistics companies – the companies that will transport Moderna vaccines to centers where Canadians can go to test.
On Monday, the Massachusetts-based company filed with the FDA for its EUA for the US market.
Data from the company’s final clinical trial is encouraging, showing that the vaccine is 94.1% effective in preventing COVID-19 and 100% effective in preventing severe cases of the disease.
Dr Howard Njoo, Canadian Deputy Director of Public Health, said the federal government is now refining who is best suited to receive an early dose of a vaccine – early indications from the National Immunization Advisory Committee (NACI) suggest that Long-term elderly nursing homes and frontline health workers will be among the first to get a chance.
Conservative leader Erin O’Toole and her party health critic Michelle Rempel Garner held a press conference this morning to discuss an opposition day motion that will ask the government to release its plan by December 16.
O’Toole accused the government of failing to provide Canadians with a plan and schedule for vaccine distribution.
“Without a concrete timeline for vaccines, companies will not have the confidence to reinvest in their operations and recruit Canadians who were laid off during the pandemic,” he said.
“Without reliable timing or details, provinces have the impossible task of establishing complex supply chains without delivery times.”
The motion requires a status update on:
- Like any type of vaccine it will be safely delivered, stored and distributed to Canadians.
- The date each vaccine type will be first distributed in Canada and the expected vaccination rate per month.
- Any planned federal guidance regarding vaccine distribution by the priority group, such as frontline health workers and the elderly.
- The plan to distribute the vaccine to indigenous communities, members of the Canadian military and veterans.
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