Vaccination Bureau's performance could be judged after Easter - Levits

RIGA - Performance of the Vaccination Bureau could be assessed after Easter, President Egils Levits said in an interview with Riga TV24 television on Friday.

Upon taking office, the new Health Minister Daniels Pavluts (For Development/For) saw that the Health Ministry had not reacted adequately to the Covid-19 situation. He proposed to set up the bureau to make the decision-making process faster, taking into consideration that the Health Minstry is a large and rather cumbersome apparatus, said Levits.

"I believe that the Vaccination Bureau took some time to take off, which is normal. It was an attempt to improve the situation. Now that the bureau has been integrated into the healthcare system, we will be able to judge its performance rather soon, after Easter, because the Health Ministry and the Vaccination Bureau have developed new strategies, which will be crucial for mass vaccination," said Levits.

Levits also said that people's reproaches to the government in Latvia were no different from people's reproaches to the governments in Germany or France, for instance. The Covid-19 pandemic is unprecedented for all governments, still, people's discontent is not unfounded.

"We will see in mid-April how the vaccination process goes, when we will have sufficient quantities of the respective vaccines. At the moment, what vaccines Latvia has received have been administered to people. Once large quantities of vaccines arrive in Latvia in mid-April, the vaccination centers must be ready," emphasized Levits.