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Berlin (dpa) - In the federal states, after the hesitant start, the hope of a quick dismantling of the Astrazeneca vaccination backlog is growing.
Several countries are expecting a significant increase in vaccinations with the British-Swedish vaccine, as a query by the German press agency revealed.
Until recently, only a small part of the cans had found their way into people's upper arms.
The reasons for this are partly surprising.
The Astrazeneca vaccination backlog in numbers
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A total of almost 3.2 million doses of the Astrazeneca vaccine should be delivered to the federal states by Thursday, according to information from the Federal Ministry of Health.
According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), however, only 514,000 doses had been administered up to and including Monday.
Compared to the vaccine quantities, the vaccination rate is still very manageable: On Monday around 59,000 people were vaccinated with Astrazeneca, over the two weekend days it was around 91,000.
One thing is clear: if the pace continues, there could be over two million cans in stockpiling by the end of the week.
Why more could actually be vaccinated now
In several federal states, vaccination appointments are already being made for the second priority group, others are planning this - and thus millions of people could soon be entitled to an Astrazeneca vaccination.
In North Rhine-Westphalia, for example, around 750,000 kindergarten teachers, day-care workers, primary school teachers and patrol officers are to receive a vaccination offer from Monday.
"We just want to vaccinate as much as we can," said NRW Health Minister Karl-Josef Laumann (CDU).
In Hesse, 12,000 doctors and medical staff have recently received their dose of Astrazeneca, and teachers, educators and police officers will soon have their turn.
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And the reservations seem to be disappearing: Brandenburg reported an occupancy rate of around 90 percent in appointments at the start of the week, in Thuringia the vaccination appointments for staff at daycare centers and primary and special schools were assigned within a few hours.
Baden-Württemberg is also seeing greater demand for appointments, and there are few reservations among teachers or educators.
In the meantime, more than a million people in the country are also entitled to vaccinations, it says from there.
The federal states had previously increased capacities in the vaccination centers.
The city of Krefeld in North Rhine-Westphalia shows how things could be done quickly.
There, on Tuesday, 600 employees of schools and daycare centers were vaccinated with Astrazeneca doses that were received at short notice and not planned - six days before the nationwide vaccination start for this group.
The reasons for the initially slow start
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However, there are still piles of vaccine in the refrigerator.
Most recently it was said that the Astrazeneca vaccine had an image problem and that was why it was administered so hesitantly.
Experience from the various countries shows that this is only part of the truth.
In Schleswig-Holstein, for example, the booking software first had to be converted in order to be able to use Astrazeneca on a large scale in the vaccination centers.
In North Rhine-Westphalia, the vaccination rate in hospitals was recently deliberately reduced because some employees were absent for a short time after the vaccination.
The vaccination appointments were therefore stretched over a longer period of time - so that not too many employees are absent from the vaccine at the same time.
And Baden-Württemberg justified the low vaccination rates with a statistical delay: Vaccinations in the hospitals are therefore only statistically recorded late in the vaccination centers.
The spokesman for the federal government, Steffen Seibert, recently refused to give the impression that the vaccine was simply lying around unused.
Vaccine could be delivered relatively fresh at first, withheld for a second vaccination or not yet vaccinated, but intended for certain vaccinations.
Further criticism of the vaccination concept
In the opinion of the social association VdK, the states should still speed up.
"The vaccine is there, but some of it goes to waste in the vaccination centers," said President Verena Bentele.
More and more members reported to the association who were chronically ill or disabled and wanted to be vaccinated, but were desperately waiting for appointments.
The VdK complained that the federal government left the procedure to the states and district administrators.
They are obviously hopelessly overwhelmed by finding people with chronic illnesses and disabilities.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210303-99-665731 / 2
Vaccination rate monitoring by the RKI
Delivery quantities Astrazeneca