Portugal Situation Report Wednesday 17^th February 2021

Introduction

Good morning – We start with the good news concerning the continuing improvement in in all the key Covid-19 statistics.

The risk map published on Monday shows consistent signs of improvement. The number of new infections has fallen in 291 of the 308 municipalities and 119 counties are now at extremely high risk, a hundred less than a week ago. This is according to data from the Directorate-General for Health (DGS) updated this Monday for the period between January 27th and February 9th. These figures are now a week old and with the continuing downward trend since then, the number of those municipalities in the high risk areas has almost certainly decreased further.

There can be no doubt that it is due to containment, reduction of movement and border restrictions. The very difficult challenge for the government is at what stage to relax measures, balancing the need to avoid any increase in cases but at the same time not prolonging more than necessary measures which clearly effect the economy and people livelihoods.

It was of interest therefore yesterday therefore that the Portuguese Foreign Minister told the British newspaper “Daily Telegraph” restrictions on travel between Portugal and the United Kingdom should be lifted before the summer, but should be maintained for a few more weeks.

He stated that “We hope that within weeks we will be able to overcome this situation and return to the normal connection between the UK and Portugal,” he said, adding that he hopes “to be able to re-establish the connection before the summer.”

Whereas this would be very good news for the tourist industry, measures would clearly need to be put in place to avoid spread of the disease from overseas, in particular the many variants that exist.

Related to this the idea of “vaccination passports” is being considered in some countries including the UK, India and Israel. However, on Monday the European Commissioner for the Economy, Paolo Gentiloni, stated that “the discussion on the certification of vaccines is still at a very early stage”, and should serve mainly as “proof that you have been vaccinated” and not as a travel passport. He added that it is not possible to “give special rights to some until the vaccine is available to everyone”, something that will hardly be achieved before the end of the year.

The idea of ​​creating a vaccination ‘passport’ that facilitates circulation in the European space without the need for a quarantine period is not ruled out, but you should not see the light of day at European level anytime soon. At least not in a concerted manner among the 27 Member States, since, unilaterally, countries like Sweden or Denmark have announced such initiatives. We wait and see developments concerning this.

Again on travel, because of the frequent law changes and extension we have decided to create two separate website pages, one for Air Travel and the other for Land and Sea travel. The latter shows the various border crossing points between Portugal and Spain and their times of opening, as well as the restrictions in place. Our International Travel page still remains in place for more general matters on this topic. We regularly receive enquiries from overseas on this subject, as well as people returning to their home countries, so please make use of these pages.

Concerning Vaccinations the Government has started Phase 1 for the general public and to date, under Phase 1, over half a million vaccines have been administered. Under Phase 1 it is important that those over the age 50 with certain pathologies, who are registered under the SNS system with a 9 digit Numero de Utente (Health Number), but have been using a private doctor rather than the Centro de Saude, now contact your doctor. This is to ensure that a statement of any pathologies is uploaded by the doctor onto the SNS system, thus ensuring your eligibility and that you are contacted through SMS for your vaccination appointment.

Portugal has now administered over half a million vaccines. It is inevitable some will compare this with other countries, particularly with the UK where the rollout rate is much higher than Portugal at this point in time. In the European Union, vaccines are sent simultaneously to all Member States and the distribution of doses is proportional to the number of inhabitants in each country. Still, Member States are vaccinating at different speeds.

At the moment, Portugal is slightly above but has almost always been on par with the average of the 27 member states.

However, we see little point in making these comparisons, as the difference of whether or not we would have received a vaccine in another country compared with Portugal maybe just a few weeks apart. The most important point is the decrease in transmissions and the RT level, which in Portugal at present is 0.77, lower than some countries where a higher number of vaccines have been administered. Also bear in mind that in the vaccination rollout figures in some countries for first dose figures may be very high, second doses are much lower. For instance, in the UK whereas 23% of the population have received their first dose, only 1% have received their second.

Trying to compare will just make people more worried. The Portuguese Government has ensured the supply of the vaccines with 22 million ordered for the whole population and that is what is most important.

Have a Safe Day

Headlines

Vaccination update

The Minister of Health, Marta Temido, said yesterday that more than half a million vaccines for Covid-19 had already been administered by 1:00 pm on February 15th.

At a press conference to take stock of the vaccination program for Covid-19, in Lisbon, the Minister referred that “533 070 inoculations, about 333 thousand first doses and 200 thousand second doses» had been carried out”.

Marta Temido added that, at the moment, “the estimated vaccine coverage against Covid-19 is 2.02% of the resident population on the continent, which is equivalent to 5.40 doses of vaccines per 100 people”.

The plan for this week is, stressed the Minister, “the administration of 143 thousand doses of vaccines”, which will continue to affect people residing in residential structures for the elderly, who currently have a vaccination rate of 72%, as well as on health professionals, essential services and the population over 80 or over 50 and with associated comorbidities.

Marta Temido also pointed out that this week 27,500 second doses will be administered to complete vaccination cycles.

The Minister of Health also referred that Portugal received 694 800 doses of vaccines against Covid-19 up to February 12th, of which 42 900 had been sent to the Autonomous Regions of the Azores and Madeira.

The week will be marked by the arrival of more than 200 thousand doses and Marta Temido stressed that the last update of vaccines to be received in the first quarter of 2021 points to 2.5 million doses.

Covid-19 Situation

Yesterday’s Covid-19 statistics are as follows highlighting the various trends:

Confirmed Cases: 788.561 (+ 1502 / + 0.19 %)

Number of admitted: 4.482 (-350 /-7.24 %)

Number of ICU admitted: 752 (-32 /-4.08 %)

Deaths: 15.522 (+ 111 / + 0.72 %)

Recovered: 677.719 (+ 8865 / + 1.33 %)

Active cases: 95,320 (-7474 / – 7.2%)

The main trends from these figures are as follows:

– Deaths higher than yesterday but lowest since 11th January

– New cases – 3^rd lowest since 13^th October 2020 (4 months)

– Recovered cases nearly 5 times more than new cases

– Hospitalisation and ICU significant decreases

– Number of active cases lowest since 10th January, decreasing for 16th consecutive day and a 47.5% decrease since 31st January (in 15 days)

– Those under surveillance lowest since 11th January

Health

Covid-19: More than 183,000 people have used the online simulator on vaccination lists

More than 183 thousand people have used the SNS online simulator since Sunday to consult the vaccination lists against Covid-19, a process that has raised some difficulties, but which has been resolved, according to the president of SPMS.

“We are attentive to the errors that are appearing in the system, many have to do with the fact that it is a new tool, people are not familiar with it and do not always use it in the best conditions”, the President told the Lusa agency today from SPMS – Shared Services of the Ministry of Health, Luís Goes Pinheiro.

This official added that, “as far as possible”, they have tried to improve this tool and try to make it “less sensitive to operating errors”.

“The simulator is new and it is normal for people to want to use it very much” and “it has been used with great intensity”, underlined Luís Goes Pinheiro, adding that since Sunday it has been used by more than 183 thousand people, of whom about 21,000 took the opportunity to update their contacts on the portal.

There were also 323 users who indicated that they did not have an SNS (National Health Service) number, having left their data so that they could be worked on later.

According to Luís Goes Pinheiro, some reports of problems have come to the SPMS about the use of the simulator, “but in ever fewer numbers”.

“This means that, on the one hand, people are learning to deal with the tool and, on the other hand, we have also been trying to improve it since Sunday to make it the best possible and we will continue to do so,” he assured. .

In this regard, he announced that he requested ANAFRE – National Parish Association to disclose all information related to the simulator to the parish councils.

The objective, he explained, is “to support people who may experience more difficulties, or who are unable to use information systems at home, so that they can go to the parish councils and, with their support, use the simulator”.

Seven ministers have already been vaccinated, deputies start receiving the first dose today

The Prime Minister and seven more members of the Government have already received the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine. In the Parliament, some deputies start to be vaccinated this Tuesday, while others still await the contact of the health authorities, reports the Observer

These are the Minister of State and the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, Mariana Vieira da Silva, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Augusto Santos Silva, the Minister of Internal Administration, Eduardo Cabrita, the Minister of Justice, Francisca Van Dunem, the Minister of Health, Marta Temido, the Minister of Infrastructure, Pedro Nuno Santos, and the Minister of the Environment, João Pedro Matos Fernandes. They all received – like the Prime Minister – the AstraZeneca vaccine, since they are under 65 years old.

However, only António Costa announced on social media that he took the first dose of the vaccine on Monday, reaffirming the goal of “70% of the adult population in Portugal to be vaccinated by the end of the summer”.

In the Parliament, some deputies begin this Tuesday to be vaccinated, while others still await the contact of the health authorities, according to the newspaper. Only Ferro Rodrigues and Edite Estrela were vaccinated on Friday at the Hospital das Forças Armadas, as President and Vice President of the Assembly of the Republic.

Vaccination passport? European Commissioner: “We cannot give special rights to some until the vaccine is available to everyone”

The European Commissioner for the Economy, Paolo Gentiloni, stated on Monday that “the discussion on the certification of vaccines is still at a very early stage”, and should serve mainly as “proof that you have been vaccinated” and not as a travel passport. Asked at a press conference that followed a Eurogroup meeting, the official explained that it is not possible to “give special rights to some until the vaccine is available to everyone”, something that will hardly be achieved before the end of the year.

The idea of ​​creating a vaccination ‘passport’ that facilitates circulation in the European space without the need for a quarantine period is not ruled out, but you should not see the light of day at European level anytime soon. At least not in a concerted manner among the 27 Member States, since, unilaterally, countries like Sweden or Denmark have announced such initiatives. The same is happening or being discussed in different formats in different countries around the world, such as Israel, India or the United Kingdom.

The issue has raised some ethical issues related to discrimination between citizens, but several voices in the European Union – including the President of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen – do not completely dismiss this hypothesis, as long as legal issues are resolved. Firstly, due to purely medical and public health needs, but also as a way of boosting the resumption of tourist activity and facilitating intra-community circulation.

The matter was discussed in the January 21st leaders’ videoconference. At the time, the heads of state and government agreed to work on a common certificate format for medical purposes, leaving the debate on other uses for later. For now, it is intended to support the interoperability of this type of certificates and to guarantee the standardisation and mutual recognition of vaccination certificates as medical documents. The possibility of global coordination through the World Health Organization is also accepted. However, the debate and the attempt at coordination are still ongoing and there is no date for a final consensus.

Portugal to receive 1.25 million vaccines from Johnson & Johnson in the second quarter

The President of the National Medicines Authority (Infarmed) announced that Portugal should receive in the second quarter of the year the first vaccines from Johnson & Johnson, a drug whose application for approval was submitted to the European regulator this Tuesday.

“By the time we are gathered here, the process must be formalised with the European Medicines Agency ” (EMA) of the vaccine produced by Janssen, said Rui Santos Ivo in the Eventual Commission for monitoring the application of measures to respond to the disease pandemic Covid-19 and the economic and social recovery process.

According to the Head of Infarmed, the new drug from Janssen (pharmaceutical company of Johnson & Johnson) for single use now enters the final evaluation phase and, “if all goes well” with the evaluation of its safety and effectiveness, it is expected that be approved next month, with the first dose deliveries scheduled for the second quarter of this year.

At the end of January, the medical director at Janssen told Lusa that the commitment remained to make vaccines available in the European Union in the second quarter of this year, when Portugal will receive the first 1.25 million doses.

“The commitment to the European Union is the second quarter of 2021 and this commitment continues,” said Manuel Salavessa at the time, adding that the first 1.25 million vaccines of the American company against covid-19 are part of a 4.5 million lot that the country will receive throughout this year.

Testing

Graça Freitas: “It is estimated that approximately 100 thousand tests can be carried out daily”

The Director-General of Health, Graça Freitas, estimated, in an interview with the newspaper Público, that Portugal could reach the 100,000 daily tests of Covid-19.

“If we were able to maintain around 70,000 to 80,000 tests for two or three months, it would be good. The average was 51,000 in January and a little lower in February, 41,000” she said, adding that “it is estimated that around 100,000 tests can be carried out daily, whether for PCR or rapid antigen tests”.

This is a strategy, he said, to maintain “as long as it is considered relevant, depending on the evolution of the epidemic”.

On the issue of testing, the public health specialist recalled that “DGS has many consultants” and “one of the topics that is regularly revisited is testing”.

“We tested a lot of people in January. We reached a value that was around 77 thousand tests in one day. In our strategy, one of the proposals at this point is what can be called an opportunistic screening – a person goes to a health centre or health facility for some other reason and your doctor or nurse [can] ask you if you want to do a test. This will allow us to identify some positive cases, which will be few, but above all to understand what is going on under this low incidence. But we have the problem of false negatives, because if there is not enough viral load, a test can be negative”, he explained.

Covid-19: Occupancy rate of 75% in intensive care at the hospitals of the Centre

Public hospitals in the Centro region have a 75% occupancy rate in intensive care dedicated to the Covid-19, the Centre’s Regional Health Administration (ARS) source told Lusa.

“The occupancy rate in the Covid wards in the region’s hospitals is 72% and in the Covid ICU [Intensive Care Unit] is 75%” in the public hospitals in the area of ​​influence of the ARS Centro, reveals a press release.

The note added that, up until Monday at midnight, “1,029 people were hospitalised with Covid-19, 892 in the infirmary and 137 in the Intensive Care Unit, and of these, 85 ventilated”.

In the region, which includes public hospitals in the districts of Aveiro, Castelo Branco, Coimbra, Guarda, Leiria and Viseu, ARS Centro recorded “17 deaths in a hospital setting”.

ARS registered 92 hospital admissions and 133 discharges, “130 from the infirmary Covid and three from the ICU Covid”, in all hospitals in the region.

In the rear support structures and in the social / private sector “49 Covid patients are hospitalized, six less than the previous day, in 110 active beds”, up until 00:00 today.

Rates of infection by municipality

Covid-19. Number of cases goes down in almost all municipalities but 245 maintain a very high risk

Four out of five municipalities are still painted red on the risk map. Even so, there are signs of improvement and, unlike what happened a week ago, there is no longer a municipality above 4 thousand new infections per 100 thousand inhabitants

The risk map for Covid-19 by municipality is still mostly painted red, but there are already consistent signs of improvement. The number of new infections has fallen in 291 of the 308 municipalities and 119 counties are now at extremely high risk, a hundred less than a week ago, according to data from the Directorate-General for Health (DGS) updated this Monday. and for the period between January 27th and February 9th.

Although there was a decrease in the incidence in almost all municipalities in the country, in many cases this decrease only allowed the municipalities to move from the maximum level of the risk scale to the second highest level. And that means that they continue to have more than 480 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants in two weeks, above what is already considered worrying by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).

There are still 245 municipalities (80% of the total) above that level, although they are less than the 277 that were in the same situation a week ago.

Castanheira de Pêra (3596), Fronteira (3362), Castelo de Vide (3083) and São João da Pesqueira (3032) are the only four with an incidence above 3 thousand new cases per 100 thousand inhabitants between January 27 and 9 February. A week ago, there were 12 counties above this value and in the previous week they were almost double.

Among the few municipalities that have seen the number of new infections increase, is Castanheira de Pera, with the highest incidence in the country, Monchique and five municipalities in Madeira, such as Porto Moniz, Ponta do Sol, Funchal, Santana and Câmara de Lobos . Until recently, the region of Madeira was the only one where the average number of people that each infected population (Rt) was not below 1.

There are 63 counties with less than 480 new cases per 100 thousand inhabitants and with a downward trajectory. Celorico de Basto, Ponte de Sor, Vila Velha de Ródão and Portel managed to drop from the maximum level of risk to lower levels in a short time.

International Travel

United Kingdom willing to provide vaccination “certificates” for international travel

The British government is willing to provide vaccination “certificates” for international travel if required by other countries, but has ruled out domestic use, said today the secretary of state responsible for the Covid-19 immunization program, Nadhim Zahawi.

Some countries have started to demand a [vaccination] certificate, as we do now with (Covid-19) tests before travelling,” he explained, speaking to the British ITV TV station.

According to Zahawi, some countries only allow people to enter if they have some kind of certificate that proves that they have been vaccinated against the coronavirus. “We will try to make it easier for the individual” to ask, he said.

Israel has announced in recent days that it has reached principle agreements with Greece and Cyprus to allow unrestricted movement of citizens vaccinated against the new coronavirus between their respective countries, while in Europe, Sweden and Denmark have already announced the creation of certificates of digital vaccinations for trips abroad, similar to Iceland.

Zahawi stressed, however, that so-called “vaccination passports” will not be used in the UK domestically to allow the current restrictions to be eased.

European economy

Portugal was the fourth country in the Eurozone that grew the most in the fourth quarter

In a quarter when the economy in the Eurozone contracted 0.6% compared to the previous three months, Portugal’s GDP was the fourth to recover most. However, in the year-on-year comparison, the Portuguese economy recorded the weakest performances, indicating that it is far from recovering from pre-pandemic levels.

The 0.4% chain growth of the Portuguese economy in the fourth quarter of 2020 was the fourth highest among Eurozone countries that have already presented data.

According to the report published this Tuesday by Eurostat, Spain matched the growth of Portugal and best only Cyprus, Lithuania and Latvia.

The Eurozone, on the other hand, registered a 0.6% contraction compared to the previous three months, even better than that announced in the first estimate (-0.7%).

Among the major economies, and at a time when several countries have not yet reported their fourth quarter GDP, only Germany has managed to grow. The largest European economy advanced 0.1% in the fourth quarter, while France contracted 1.3% and Italy retreated 2%.

Extending the analysis to the entire European Union, there are more countries with growth above Portugal, such as Romania (5.3%), Bulgaria (2.2%), Hungary (1.1%), Denmark (0.6%) and Sweden (0.5%).

Eurostat: Eurozone GDP falls 6.8% and EU 6.4% in 2020

It is the first estimate of the annual growth rate for 2020, based on seasonally adjusted and calendar quarterly data. Employment rate increased

The eurozone economy retreated 6.8% in 2020 and that of the European Union (EU) slowed 6.4%, with the employment rate increasing in both, according to a quick estimate advanced by Eurostat this Tuesday.

According to a first estimate of the annual growth rate for 2020, based on seasonally adjusted and calendared quarterly data, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) fell 6.8% in the euro area and 6.4% in the EU.

The EU statistical office further estimates that employment growth in 2020 was 1.8% in the euro area and 1.6% in the EU, based on quarterly data

Other News

Digital transition of schools foresees 260 thousand more computers

Government assumes an investment of € 559 ​​million to acquire 260 thousand computers for individual use, intended for students and teachers.

Portugal’s Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR) provides for the purchase of 260 thousand computers for students and teachers, in the context of the modernisation of the digital school, which will have a total investment of 500 million euros.

The objective of the digital transition in schools is “to create conditions for educational and pedagogical innovation through the development of skills in digital technologies, their transversal integration in the different curricular areas and the modernization of the Portuguese educational system”, says the PRR, today placed in public consultation.

To this end, the Government reserves a total investment of 559 million euros, 500 million of which for the continent and is the responsibility of the General Secretariat for Education and Science that will allow the purchase of 260 thousand computers for individual use, intended for students and teachers.

The amount is also intended for the purchase of 15 thousand pieces of equipment suitable for the administrative needs of schools and for the expansion of internet connectivity of the Extended Education Network.

The creation of more than a thousand laboratories for Digital Education and the installation of projection equipment in 43,000 classrooms is also planned.

In addition to the amount expected for the continent, 21 million euros are earmarked for digitizing Education in Madeira and 38 million for the Azores.