German docs claim hospital ‘given just 3 jabs & medical staff blocked from vaccinating by red tape’ in rollout shambles
A GERMAN doctor has lifted the lid on the country's vaccine rollout shambles as she claimed one hospital only got three jabs and elsewhere medics face being blocked by red tape.
Angela Merkel's shambolic Covid jab rollout has been blasted by leading doctors who are desperate to vaccinate patients and help accelerate an end to the pandemic as Germany extended its lockdown for three weeks.
🦠 Read our coronavirus live blog for the latest news & updates...
Daniela Stock, a consultant doctor at a hospital in Cologne, told The Sun Online about the failures she has seen during the rollout as just 6.6million people have been jabbed so far in Germany.
She claimed one hospital she is aware of received only three vaccines, while her hospital was sent just 15 to cover a staff of 550.
Health workers and patients are being left unprotected as Germany continues to record up to 10,000 new cases a day amid fears of another surge.
Virologist Christian Drosten also criticised the current government approach to vaccinations, pointing out “a German perfectionism had arisen.”
He called for urgent involvement of family and industrial practitioners in vaccination - with the rollout now being narrowly extended to GPs in some parts of Germany.
'CLOCK IS TICKING'
“The clock is ticking,” warned the chief virologist of the Berlin Charité on podcast.
“What we need are many more contact points. It doesn't have to be at Ikea, but our general practitioners should also be allowed to immunize, please.”
Vaccine delivery in Germany has been sluggish so far as it has been hampered by production delays, political infighting and confusion over the use of the Oxford jab in over-65s.
German newspaper Handelsblatt reported that the jab was "hardly effective in seniors" in a controversial article on January 25 - but the data used to back the claims was rubbished by AstraZeneca.
It came despite a study finding that just one shot of the British-made Covid jab slashes older people’s risk of being taken to hospital by 94 per cent.
A bombshell poll has revealed that Europeans are losing faith with the EU vaccine rollout, with only one in six Germans thinking it has gone well.
Criticism is harshest in Germany where more than half of people think Brussels has made a bad job of it, and just 17% that it's done well.
The country will also now approve the AstraZeneca vaccine for the over 65s, Merkel confirmed in a U-turn of previous policy banning it for older people.
Dr Marion Charlotte Renneberg, a general medical specialist, urged the need for stockpiles of the AstraZeneca vaccine to be used urgently.
Criticising detractors of the AstraZeneca vaccine, Dr Renneberg called for higher take-up of the jab.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
"The main thing is vaccination! We should be happy and grateful that we have a vaccine,” said the vice-president of the medical association of Lower Saxony.
“Be sure to get vaccinated, with the vaccine that is currently available and in stock, because what do we want to wait for?”