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Premier Scott Moe says the Saskatchewan government will make a decision by Thursday on stretching the interval between COVID-19 vaccine doses.
Moe told Gormley on Wednesday the sudden shift from three or four weeks to four months between the first and second dose is the evolution of science.
“We’re learning more and more as the days go by and we get more and more data from other areas of the world as well as now some Canadian provinces that the one shot can be effective,” Moe said. “We can stretch out that interval to four months.
“This really changes how we are going to be able to reopen our communities (and) our industries and really start to look forward to some degree of normalcy and some degree of economic recovery.”
Moe said during a media conference Tuesday that the province was looking to extend the interval between doses. If that happened, everyone in Saskatchewan who wants a COVID vaccination could get one by the end of June.
That time frame would move to early June if more doses produced by AstraZeneca arrive in the province and if Health Canada approves the Johnson & Johnson vaccine for use.
Moe reiterated Wednesday the four-month interval “is really a game-changer” if the province is to consider relaxing any of the public health measures that currently are in place.
“There will be some modifications if we’re able to hold those hospitalizations where they are and we’re able to continue with the vaccine rollout that we anticipate — and I’m confident that both of those will occur,” Moe said.
“We are looking for the first time in a number of months, really looking seriously, at: ‘Where are we going to be able to move on the measures that we have in place?’ We’re going to be as ambitious as we are able here in Saskatchewan to start to reduce (or) remove a number of restrictions.”
AstraZeneca restrictions
After Health Canada approved AstraZeneca’s vaccine for use across the country, the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) said doses shouldn’t be given to people 65 and over.
Moe said Saskatchewan will follow that recommendation, which was made because NACI suggested the clinical trials didn’t include enough people in that age group.
The premier said the AstraZeneca vaccine has proven to be just as effective as others like Pfizer and Moderna in other countries, so the province is definitely going to use the 15,000 AstraZeneca doses that are expected this month.
“We will most certainly get those out to people under 64 and we’ll likely be announcing exactly how that plan is going to work later this week,” Moe said.
Half a million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine arrived in Canada on Wednesday.
