La contribución farmacéutica a la pandemia de la COVID-19.
Comandante Far. Martinne Van Innis. Bélgica
The pharmacist’s contribution to the COVID-19 pandemic
Van Innis M., Delapas A.1, Olivier G.2
Sanid. mil. 2022 79 (Extraordinario) 45
In order to fight the COVID-19 spreading, Belgium started
a huge vaccine campaign as soon as the first vaccine was avail-able.
Rapidly, the medical logistics were launched. The Belgian
government inventoried the capacity of vaccines’ storage and
designated the medical Hubs. Since the Military Hospital owns
ultra-low temperature freezers and because of the capacity of
Defence to deploy many people quickly, the Military Hospital
was requested to help the nation for the COVID-19 vaccina-tion.
The hospital pharmacy was put in charge to supervise the
delivery of the vaccines in straight collaboration with the local
administration of Brussel area, as well as to draw up individual
doses.
From end December 2020 onwards, the main function of the
hospital was to store the vials of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines
following the GDP, manage the defrosting and deliver it to care
homes. As the first authorized mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine
had to be stored at -80 °C, administered within 5 days and contained
5 to 7 doses, a good coordination with the government was essential
not to waste any doses of the precious vaccines. The vials’ traceabil-
1, 2
ity was ensured by the pharmacy, and the government managed all
transports as well as the distribution of the vials.
The second phase began in January 2021 which consisted in the
vaccination of the population following a prioritization determined
by the government. During this phase, the Military Hospital stored
the four authorized vaccines, prepared the injections as well as
performed and traced the vaccination. Members from other armed
forces units i.e., also nonmedical personnel came in support to the
hospital staff.
The main job of the pharmacy, in particular, consisted of the
vaccine syringes preparation. All was done following the Good
Hospital Pharmacy Practice. Each vaccine’s syringe was made
in a sterile environment in a vertical-flow hood. The pharmacists
of Defence came helping in turns and were trained by the hospital
pharmacy team. Their work consisted in writing protocols, man-aging
the multidoses vials thawing, handling the speed of making
syringes (considering the stability of each vaccine at room tempera-ture),
controlling the labelling and encoding the batches’ references
to ensure traceability.
1 Pharmacist at the Military Hospital Queen Astrid, Pharmacist Lieu�-
tenant (OF-1), Belgian Defence. astrid.delapas@mil.be
2 Hospital Pharmacist at the Military Hospital Queen Astrid, Pharma�-
cist Commandant (OF-3), Belgian Defence