Study on COVID-19 vaccination in the Americas

Estudio de la vacunación contra el COVID-19 a nivel de América

Introduction: one of our current expectations is to supply safe and effective vaccines to be administered to the population. The endpoint is achieving herd immunity through vaccination in order to break the chain of transmission. COVID 19 vaccination strategies expanding access to vaccine doses are necessary. Prioritization on the basis of ethical principles and risk criteria is required. Objective: to compare whether there are differences in COVID 19 vaccination rates per 100 people among the different countries of the Americas. Materials and methods: the vaccination database with the information collected to May 7 2021 was used. An analysis of variance test was applied using the SPSS v.25 statistical package. Results: the p-value obtained in the statistical analysis of variance test for the vaccination variable was 0.000, which is less than  α =0.05, therefore, the hypothesis (Ho) is rejected, which means, the analysis of variance test indicates there are significant differences in COVID-19 vaccination in the different countries of America. Conclusions: the outlook for COVID-19 vaccination in the Americas is quite worrying, as there are several countries with very low vaccination rates, maybe due to the fact vaccination is not a priority for all countries, especially for those with low population density, who are not experiencing high COVID 19 infection and death rates.

1. World Health Organization. Novel Coronavirus (‎2019-nCoV)‎: situation report. World Health Organization; 2020. p. 7.
2. Casas I, Mena G. La vacunación de la COVID-19. Medicina Clínica. 2021;156(10):500-2. doi: 10.1016/j.medcli.2021.03.001
3. European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. COVID-19 vaccination and prioritization strategies in the EU/EEA [Internet]. [Consultado 7 May 2021]; Disponible en: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/publications-data/covid-19-vaccination-and-prioritisation-strategies-eueea
4. Ministerio de Sanidad, Consumo y Bienestar Social. Estrategia de vacunación COVID-19 en España [Internet]. [consultado 7 May 2021]; Disponible en: https://www.mscbs.gob.es/profesionales/saludPublica/ccayes/alertasActual/nCov/vacunaCovid19.htm
5. Jeyanathan M, Afkhami S, Smaill F, Miller MS, Lichty BD, Xing Z. Immunological considerations for COVID-19 vaccine strategies. Nat Rev Immunol. 2020;20(10):615–32. doi: 10.1038/s41577-020-00434-6
6. Statista. Mortality rate due to coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in selected countries in Latin America and the Caribbean as of March 8 [Internet]. 2021 [consultado 7 May 2021]; Disponible en: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1114603/latin-america-coronavirus-mortality-rate/
7. COVID-19 in Latin America: a humanitarian crisis. Lancet. 2020;396(10261):1463. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(20)32328-X
8. Dreser A. Retos y avances en la vacunación contra COVID-19 en Latinoamérica y el Caribe. Salud UIS. 2021;53: e21002. doi: 10.18273/saluduis.53.e:21002
9. Kim J, Marks F, Clemens JD. Looking beyond COVID-19 vaccine phase 3 trials. Nat Med. 2021;27:205–211. doi: 10.1038/s41591-021-01230-y
10. Dale B, Stylianou N. Vacunas contra el Coronavirus: ¿Cuál es la situación de tu país? [Internet]. BBC News Mundo; 2021 [consultado 7 May 2021]; Disponible en: https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-56025727
11. Díaz-Pinzón JE. Estudio de los resultados del contagio por COVID-19 a nivel mundial. Repert Med Cir. 2020;29(Núm. Supl.1):65-71. doi: 10.31260/RepertMedCir.01217372.1089
12. Díaz-Pinzón, J.E. Proyección del COVID-19 en Colombia. Rev. Med. 2020;28(1):11-20. doi: https://doi.org/10.18359/rmed.4702
13. Díaz-Pinzón, J.E. Soporte técnico de simulación Phet en la enseñanza y aprendizaje de fracciones equivalentes. Revista de investigaciones Universidad del Quindío. 2016;28(2):31-41. doi: https://doi.org/10.33975/riuq.vol28n2.6
14. Laxminarayan R, Fitzpatrick S, Levin S. How to Build Trust in Covid-19 Vaccines. Why people distrust vaccines and how they can be convinced otherwise. Nautilus [Internet]. Nautilus 2020 [consultado 7 May 2021]; Disponible en: https://nautil.us/issue/93/forerunners/how-to-build-trust-in-covid_19-accines