ROME – Italy plans to vaccinate 10 million to 15 million of its roughly 60 million citizens against Covid-19 by April next year, said Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte yesterday.
At a year-end press conference, he said under the country’s mass vaccination campaign, the first group of people to be inoculated will be 1.8 million doctors, nurses, and nursing home residents and staff, reported the Xinhua news agency.
They will be followed by 4.4 million people aged over 80, 13.4 million people aged between 60 and 79, and 7.4 million elderly people affected by at least one chronic illness.
According to the nation’s vaccination plan, which was approved by Parliament on December 2, these initial categories will be followed by teachers and other essential service providers, as well as prison inmates and staff.
The rest of the population will be vaccinated after all these categories are covered.
“We should be able to vaccinate 10 million to 15 million people by April,” said Conte.
The pandemic has claimed more than 73,000 lives in Italy since the country reported its first case in February, according to the latest data from the Health Ministry.
Conte said the government will not make the vaccine mandatory, but it is assessing whether to issue a special form of identification to people who get the jab so that they can move around more freely than those who refuse it.
The vaccination campaign kicked off in Italy and the rest of the European Union on Sunday. – Bernama, December 31, 2020
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