The president of the Global Alliance for Vaccines, Durão Barroso, warned this Thursday that Portugal is behind Europe in the administration of the third dose of the vaccine against covid-19 and called on the authorities not to have “a relaxation of the effort”.

“Portugal, which achieved the best results in the world in terms of vaccination with the first two doses, at the moment the truth is that there is a certain complacency. We are behind most countries in the world and we have to recover that”, said José Manuel Durão Barroso.

In a debate on “Health and Innovation: The (Last) Lessons of a Pandemic” within the scope of the 8th annual meeting of the Council of the Portuguese Diaspora, in Cascais, the former Portuguese Prime Minister recalled that “it is more than the past” that vaccines prevent at least the most severe cases of covid-19 and death, hovering above that the overwhelming majority of people dying today were not vaccinated.

He also recalled that the new Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 is not as deadly as the previous ones, namely as the Delta variant, but it has a capacity that Delta did not have to escape the protection that vaccines can against infections or reinfections, “why it’s growing exponentially”.

“All this recommends that people get vaccinated and, if they can take the third dose, they should take it,” said Durão Barroso, for whom “political office holders must have the courage to explain to people” in the facts.

Speaking to Lusa on the sidelines of the meeting, Durão Barroso congratulated “very sincerely” all those who contributed to the success of the vaccination in the first two doses of the anti-covid-19 vaccine, but regretted that, in relation to the third dose behind the European average .