Official Says Goal Is 2.5 Million Vaccinated by Mid-June

Vaccination (BETAPHOTO/DRAGAN GOJIC/MO)

Ministry of Health State Secretary Mirsad Djerlek has said that the plan is to continue accelerating immunization against the coronavirus and that work is under way to achieve it, while the goal is two and a half million citizens inoculated with both doses of a vaccine by mid-June.

"We are making agreements with domestic and foreign companies through the Serbian Chamber of Commerce so that people in the economy are vaccinated urgently, because how we will be able to further finance the enormous expenses we have for the health care system depends on that," said Djerlek, who is also the head of the National Coordination Team for Immunization, told the March 31 issue of the Politika newspaper.

Djerlek said that the National Coordination Team had formed a working group which had created a number of modern models of motivation for vaccination, adding that their implementation and "a serious campaign" would start very soon.

He also said that he had seen some companies using a financial reward as motivation for people to get vaccinated, but added that the government would not be doing that. Two million vaccines will arrive in Serbia in early April, Djerlek said, stressing that he wanted them to be used up as soon as possible.