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Professional medical associations should express their position on vaccination against COVID-19, publicly urge vaccinations – Head of National Immunization Technical Advisory Group
KYIV. Aug 27 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Professional medical associations should publicize their position on vaccination against COVID-19 and publicly urge citizens to be vaccinated, said Head of National Immunization Technical Advisory Group Fedir Lapiy.
"If we are talking about vaccination of people with serious concomitant diseases, then the question of professional associations arises. Why it is not a problem to find the position and recommendations of a professional association, for example, European, Israeli or Canadian oncologists or endocrinologists, but there are no positions of our oncologists, endocrinologists, gynecologists, cardiologists. There are no rheumatologists. Professional associations are inactive in this regard. If they expressed their position and, following the example of foreign colleagues, supported vaccination, this would be an additional impetus for doctors not to discourage vaccination," he said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
Lapiy noted that doctors at the secondary-tertiary level of care often discourage their patients from being vaccinated against COVID-19.
"When an elderly person turns to a specialist doctor at the secondary health care assistance and asks his opinion about vaccination, for example, if he has an oncology, if he needs to be vaccinated, then the doctor, as a rule, says: you have an oncology, why do you still need to be burdened with vaccination? The same is with pregnant women, cardio patients, diabetic patients, and other diseases. We see that there is a barrier among medical workers when people are ready to be vaccinated, and doctors discourage them," he said.
According to Lapiy, this barrier can be overcome by wider access to vaccination and the formation of a cultural environment from vaccinated people. "Let’s make points at bazaars, shops. The rule of the cultural environment will work: when everyone around is vaccinated, it is easier for a person to make a decision about vaccination," he said.
