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Published Friday, February 12, 2021
Miscounts found in the covid-19
vaccination campaign inspection
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A Social Security audit process found fails in the people who got the vaccine against covid-19 at the Carlos María Ulloa nursing home, located in Guadalupe Canton, San José Province.
According to the investigation, the doses of the treatment were applied to the elderly who live in nursing homes and the employees, as part of the government approved pre-selected “Group A.”
According to the audit, it was detected that the information provided by the people in charge of the nursing home shows errors.
The first was detected after the Ministry of Health reported 171 workers at the nursing home. However, the people in charge of the nursing home reported 188 workers, that is, 17 extra workers.
But those 17 people are not registered as formal workers of the nursing home. Furthermore, these people are not registered either in the Social Security as formal nursing home workers.
The auditors found that these people are registered as workers of other organizations and not of the nursing home.
The audit sent a report of the investigation to the Ministry of Health, where it is determined that there is a non-compliance with the guidelines established in the vaccination campaign.
The results of the investigation will be used to determine the people responsible for the error in the vaccination process.
This is the second case of error detected by the auditors in the vaccination campaign.
In the first week of February, auditors found several faults of the vaccination campaign at the Enrique Baltodano Hospital in Liberia Canton, Guanacaste Province.
According to the results of the inspection, 78 professionals who work in the emergency room and the special unit to treat covid-19 patients were not vaccinated, instead, other hospital workers got the treatment.
Sixteen hospital workers should not have been vaccinated because their roles are different. They are not part of the emergency room staff, the delivery unit, the covid-19 unit or the medical service.
The correct action would have been to inoculate workers in emergency areas and those dedicated 100% to work in covid-19-specific areas, Social Security said in its statement.
Social Security opened an investigation to find the people responsible for this error.
Since the start of the vaccination campaign against covid-19 in December 2020, 75,113 doses of covid-19 vaccines have been applied. Reaching a national vaccination rate of 1.45 per 100 inhabitants. Of those already vaccinated, 63,775 were applied to first responders and 11,338 to the elderly in long-stay homes and workers in these centers, according to Social Security.
Although the vaccination campaign remains active, deaths and infections continue to increase according to the most recent statistics of the covid-19 in the country. The Ministry of Health reported on Thursday the following updates:
• 431 new covid-19 cases are reported, bringing the total to 35,527 current active cases.
• 24,631 foreign-born people have been infected as part of the 199,187 cases since March, approximately 12.3% of the total cases. Of these, authorities confirmed the death of 32 foreign-born patients. But since October, there is no updated information about foreign-born deaths due to covid-19.
• 350 patients are being treated in public hospitals, where 182 patients are in ICU’s in delicate health conditions. Their ages range from 1 to 93-years-old. And 182 patients are in recovery rooms. Many of the remaining infected patients are quarantined in their homes.
• 160,946 patients have fully recovered, an 81% recovery rate of the total cases since March.
• 617,086 covid-19 tests have been conducted in Costa Rica since March, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering of Johns Hopkins University in the U.S.
• 2,714 deaths are listed as covid-19 related, approximately 1.4% death rate. Of these 1,022 are women and 1,692 men. The ages range from a 2-year-old to a 101-year-old.
Readers can see the current number of infected people in each district on the National Distance Education University on its Covid-19 Map.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the pandemic has killed more than 2.3 million people worldwide.
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How could Social Security better control the vaccination campaign? We would like to know your thoughts on this story. Send your comments to news@amcostarica.com
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