Berlin (AFP)

Defended by most governments and health authorities, the AstraZeneca / Oxford anti-Covid vaccine, which is less effective than its messenger RNA competitors, continues to arouse suspicion in part of Europe.

In Germany, doctors and public health officials on Thursday called for this vaccine, which is cheaper and easier to store, to be used more.

Despite the German failures of the vaccine campaign and the difficulties of producing vaccines against the coronavirus, tens of thousands of vials of the product designed by the British University of Oxford and the Anglo-Swedish group AstraZeneca remain unused.

Vaccination appointments are not honored, warn the German health authorities.

In Saxony (east), a region with one of the highest infection rates in Germany, more than 2,500 available vaccination slots were not used this week, according to the German Red Cross.

German Minister of Health, Jens Spahn, has defended this vaccine, "safe and effective" like those of BioNTech / Pfizer and Moderna.

The latter two, based on messenger RNA technology, have an efficiency rate of over 90%, compared to 60% for AstraZeneca.

- "Second class" -

In France, if the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, received a dose of this vaccine in public, the time is also for mistrust.

This vaccine is not "second class", tries to reassure Alain Fischer, coordinator in France of the vaccination campaign.

But the drug agency ANSM noted 149 declarations (out of 10,000 vaccinations between February 6 and 10) of influenza syndromes, often of high intensity (high fever, body aches, headaches) after injection of this product.

Same trend in Austria, where hundreds of medical staff across the country have canceled their immunization appointments after reports of possible side effects such as fever.

A group of doctors in the province of Salzburg also pressured the government to provide BioNTech vaccines rather than AstraZeneca, arguing that it works faster and protects patients better.

In Bulgaria, which has not introduced age limits unlike other European countries, there is great mistrust among the elderly.

In Italy, the disorder arose out of the opposition of the Order of Private Physicians and Dentists of Rome, which represents those not working in hospitals, to the vaccination of its members with AstraZeneca, which would not offer protection. sufficient.

"The attitude of doctors who do not want the AstraZeneca vaccine is snobbish. If I had not done the Pfizer vaccine, I would have done AstraZeneca, knowing that the latter is less effective", gets carried away Massimo Galli, director of the infectious diseases department of Sacco hospital in Milan (north).

- "Catastrophic" communication -

"If you have the choice between AstraZeneca now or another vaccine in a few months, you should definitely take AstraZeneca now," pleads Carsten Watzl, secretary general of the German Society for Immunology.

In Germany, this skepticism is partly linked to the contradictory messages delivered in January by the health authorities.

Before encouraging its use, they had expressed doubts about its effectiveness for the elderly to the point that the Vaccines Commission advised against its use for those over 65 years of age.

As a result, of the approximately 740,000 doses delivered to the 16 German Länder, only 107,000 were administered, regretted Thursday the Robert Koch health watch institute.

Only one in three Germans under 65 would be ready to receive this vaccine, according to a poll carried out for the daily Tagesspiegel.

The Greens, the country's second political force, blame this skepticism on Angela Merkel's team and its "really catastrophic communication strategy".

The massive use of this vaccine is however essential in order to meet the objective, set by the Chancellor, that all Germans have received at least a first dose in early autumn.

Only 3.6% of the population had received a first dose on Wednesday, reserved at this stage for nursing staff and the elderly.

To avoid any waste, the Anglo-Swedish vaccine should be offered to non-priority patients, including members of the police.

© 2021 AFP