President Piñera begins COVID-19 vaccination process for under 18s
During its first stage, adolescents between 12 and 17 years of age interned in National Service for Minors (SENAME) centers and SENAME service provider centers, those receiving mental health treatment and those with comorbidity will be vaccinated.
This Tuesday, President of Chile Sebastián Piñera officially began the SARS-COV-2 vaccination process for children and adolescents. Minors between 12 and 17 years of age interned in SENAME centers and SENAME service provider centers, those receiving mental health treatment and those that suffer specific comorbidities will now be able to receive vaccinations.
“The vaccine is voluntary, but we all have a moral obligation to get vaccinated. It is not only about protecting our own health; if we don’t get vaccinated, we’re putting the health of those that we love at risk, our families, our loved ones, our work colleagues and our communities,” the President declared during the opening of the process at Santiago’s Instituto Teletón, accompanied by Health Minister Enrique Paris and Social Development and Family Minister Karla Rubilar.
During its first stage, those suffering certain comorbidities will be eligible for vaccination. They include chronic lung diseases, neurological diseases, kidney diseases, chronic liver diseases, metabolic diseases, heart diseases, cancer in treatment, congenital or acquired immunodeficiencies, serious mental illnesses and severe obesity.
This week will also see the start of the vaccination program for young people of 18 and 19 years of age. Those over the age of 20 who have yet to be vaccinated and women who are 16 weeks pregnant will also be vaccinated.
Chile has administered 21,385,816 doses of the SARS-COV-2 vaccine to date. Of these, 11,864,053 people have received a first dose and 9,303,900 have completed their course of vaccinations.
Last weekend, Chile received 275,908 new doses of the CanSino vaccine. With this shipment, more than 24.6 million COVID-19 vaccines have now arrived in Chile, including those from the Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca and Sinovac laboratories.
“Together we are going to overcome this pandemic. We are going to succeed in protecting our health and our lives. We are going to recuperate the jobs that have been lost. We are going to succeed in reactivating our economy and go back to living our lives to the fullest,” President Piñera concluded.