Sisak-Moslavina County has been given priority in the vaccination process and next week a complete shipment of Moderna's vaccine will be sent to the earthquake-hit county, Jutarnji List daily said on Sunday.

The number of coronavirus infections in Sisak-Moslavina County has jumped from 60 to 124 in the past two days. The increase has been expected as it was impossible to comply with epidemiological measures after a 6.2-magnitude earthquake struck the area on 29 December. The priority was to save human lives, clear the rubble and provide people with temporary accommodation.

It is still difficult to comply with epidemiological measures in that county due to a high fluctuation of people. That is why the county was given priority in the testing process and the ongoing coronavirus vaccination process.

“More than a thousand people were vaccinated in that county on Thursday alone. We are doing everything we can to keep the epidemiological situation under control. Also, we have sent large quantities of rapid antigen tests there. We have sent six teams to perform rapid antigen tests in the quake-hit area,” the head of the Croatian Public Health Institute (HZJZ), Krunoslav Capak, told Jutarnji List.

He announced that a complete shipment of Moderna’s vaccine would be sent to that county next week.

To date, 30,000 people have been vaccinated in Croatia, while 3,036 people were vaccinated in Sisak-Moslavina County alone by Friday night. A new shipment of 17,550 doses of the vaccine produced by Pfizer/BioNTech will arrive on Monday, and 4,000 doses of Moderna’s vaccine will arrive on Tuesday.

“We have talked with the prime minister and I think that Moderna’s entire shipment will go to Sisak-Moslavina County. A week later another 17,550 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine and another 6,000 doses of Moderna’s vaccine will arrive in Croatia,” Capak said.

However, mass vaccination in Croatia will commence only after AstraZeneca registers its vaccine. The first shipment of that vaccine was supposed to arrive in EU countries, including Croatia, at the end of December, but the manufacturer is still waiting for approval from European regulators. According to unofficial information, the vaccine should be registered by the end of January, and when distribution begins, more than 200,000 doses should arrive in Croatia in their first shipment (of a total of 2.7 million that Croatia ordered from that manufacturer), Jutarnji List said.