The ministry has issued a circular that clarifies some points on the administration of anti-Covid vaccines, in particular on the fourth and fifth dose. The fifth dose of vaccine against Covid is recommended for the over 80 and the frail but will also be available for the over 60 on request, reads the document signed by the director general of Prevention, Giovanni Rezza.
“In order to achieve a further consolidation of the protection conferred by vaccines against severe forms of Covid-19, and in compliance with the principle of maximum precaution”, reads a joint note from the dicastery with the Higher Health Council, Agenzia del Aifa drug and the Higher Institute of Health, “a further booster dose with a bivalent mRna vaccine is recommended, in favor of people aged 80 or over, guests of residential facilities for the elderly and people aged over or equal to 60 years with frailty motivated by concomitant / pre-existing pathologies, who have already received a second booster dose with monovalent vaccine, once at least 120 days have elapsed from the same or from the last Sars-CoV-2 infection “.
The update of the indications on the booster with bivalent vaccines in the context of the vaccination campaign is motivated by the current epidemiological context which “presents an increased circulation of the Sars-CoV-2 virus contextual to the increase in the transmissibility index above the epidemic threshold “, is explained.
“The importance of considering the possibility of co-administering the influenza vaccine and the anti Sars-CoV-2 vaccine is emphasized in the preparation and conduct of the vaccination campaign against the influenza virus”.