Italy’s Health Minister Roberto Speranza has announced that third doses of Covid-19 will be made available to groups of “clinically vulnerable” people this month. “We have the third dose in Italy,” Speranza said. “We’ll start in September with fragile patients like oncology and transplant patients”, APA reports citing The Guardian.
Speranza also suggested that the country could soon make jabs mandatory for all Italians of eligible age, as anticipated last week by prime minister Mario Draghi during a press conference.
Draghi said Italians could be obliged to get a shot, as soon as the European Medicines Agency (EMA) gives its conditional approval for four vaccines.
“The final approval from the EMA would make everything easier,” Speranza said, “but vaccines are already safe and therefore it can also be done without, as it was for healthcare staff.”
Public administration minister Renato Brunetta said that if the country will not soon reach a vaccination level of between 80% and 90%, the government “will pass a law to impose the Covid-19 vaccine on all people who are against it. A decision will be made by the end of the month.”
Italy registered 3,361 new cases on Monday and another 52 died from coronavirus, as the death toll in the country now stands at 129,567.
According to the National Statistics Agency (ISTAT), life expectancy in Italy – which ranks second behind only Japan in terms of having the greatest share of older people – fell by 1.2 years in 2020 due to Covid-19, dropping to 82.
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