VACCINE ROLLOUTS IN EUROPE ARE OFF TO A SHAKY START

Programs hampered by bureaucracy, lack of critical equipment

With a more contagious variant of the coronavirus forcing England to impose a strict new national lockdown and European nations extending restrictions in the face of rising cases, political leaders have promised that mass vaccinations will bring an end to the suffering.

But in the race to beat the virus, the virus is still way out in front.

There are shortages of needles in Italy, Greece and other countries. Spain has not trained enough nurses. France has only managed to vaccinate around 2,000 people. Poland’s program was rocked by scandal after it was revealed that celebrities were given preferential treatment. There are calls in Germany to take control over vaccine purchases from European Union authorities. Nearly every country in Europe has complained about burdensome paperwork.

And then there is the Netherlands, which has not even begun its campaign.

Around the world, inoculation efforts are rolling out slower than promised, even as new cases soar and record numbers of virus patients f lood hospitals, placing a double burden on health care providers tasked with leading vaccination drives.

In Europe, where most countries have been under varying degrees of lockdown for months, frustration is building as restrictions have been stepped up or extended while national vaccination efforts are stymied by various problems.

The threat posed by the fast-spreading variant is adding extra urgency to an already daunting challenge. And even in places where the rollout has been relatively smooth, it is not nearly fast enough to get ahead of the virus.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said England would be locked down until inoculations reached the four most vulnerable groups: nursing home residents and those who care for them, everyone over the age of 70, front-line health and social care workers, and extremely vulnerable individuals.

Johnson said that goal could be achieved by the middle of February, but that the pace of vaccinations would need to increase drastically.

With the introduction on Monday of the first doses of the vaccine developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca, British officials said the campaign could be ramped up.

To meet the February target, 2 million doses need to be given every week.

Countries of the European Union, meanwhile, started their campaigns weeks after Britain and the U.S. because of a slower approval process and have had to rely on a single vaccine, made by Pfizer and BioNTech.

While the bloc’s medical regulatory agency is expected to approve a vaccine from Moderna this week, it has yet to begin consideration of the Oxford-AstraZeneca one, which is easier to distribute as it does not need to be kept at extremely cold temperatures.

French health officials have argued that the pace of vaccinations — with only 2,000 doses administered — is deliberately cautious, in part to convince the country’s many vaccine skeptics that nothing will be forced on them.

President Emmanuel Macron, who has said that he would not tolerate an “unjustified slowness” in the campaign, has pressed aides to make sure the pace of inoculations accelerates.

One group of several dozen French doctors and health professionals warned in an open letter on Tuesday that “vaccination must be seen today as a race against time.”