Today, the first COVID-19 vaccines will be administered to residents of nursing homes and care facilities for people with intellectual disabilities in the Netherlands. 15,000 BioNTech/Pfizer vaccines are being distributed to twelve major care facilities across the country. All of these vaccines will be administered this week by institutional physicians at multiple locations of the institutions.
This first group of residents living in nursing homes and care facilities for people with intellectual disabilities is part of a larger group of 155,000 people. The (legal) representatives of the residents have already given permission for the first group’s vaccination. They will receive their second vaccination in three weeks. The remaining 140,000 people will be vaccinated in the coming weeks.
Already vaccinated
On Wednesday, 6 January 2021, the first COVID-19 vaccines were administered to care workers in nursing homes and acute care in the Netherlands. The first round of vaccinations for care workers in direct COVID care in hospitals has now been completed. Over the past week and a half, approximately 40,000 care workers in hospitals were vaccinated. At the Municipal Public Health Service (GGD), almost all time slots for care workers in nursing homes have been filled. Since last Friday, all GGD vaccination sites are open, which means that 204,000 care workers will be vaccinated in the coming weeks. This number will increase as more vaccines become available. Up to and including this weekend, the GGD has vaccinated over 35,000 care workers.