Pfizer vaccine arrives in Italy

(ANSA) - ROME, DEC 30 - The new Pfizer COVID vaccine arrived in Italy on Wednesday.
    Ten DHL planes brought the first 470,000 doses of the vaccine to the airports of Milan Malpensa, Montichiari near Milan, Bergamo Orio al Serio, Ancona Falconara, Bologna, Rome Ciampino, Naples, Pisa, Venice and Bari.
    Refrigerated vans will be escorted by police to deliver the phials to 203 administration points in the various Italian regions.
    Meanwhile the UK gave the green light to the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, after the Pfizer-BioNTech one.
    The vaccination campaign with the new vaccine is set to kick off on January 4, while Italy's is expected to start a few days earlier.
    The first Italians to get the jab will be health workers and care home residents.
    Snow had delayed the arrival of the new COVID vaccine in Italy by a day.
    The shipment had risked being stuck in Belgium because of the wintry weather that has hit Europe.
    Medical facilities will be surveilled by police during the roll-out.
    Meanwhile a row in Italy over anti-vaxxer doctors and other medical staff being obliged to vaccinate against COVID-19 is rumbling on.
    The government has yet to decide whether to make COVID vaccination compulsory.
    In Pavia near Milan, only 2 out of 10 workers in the city's 85 care homes say they are willing to be vaccinated against the novel coronavirus.
    Health Undersecretary Sandro Zampa said making vaccines obligatory for health operators "should be considered".
    But Civil Service Minister Fabiana Dadone said that only a "strong recommendation" should suffice.
    The president of the federation of Italian doctors guilds, Filippo Anelli, said "it must be politicians, on the basis of the numbers, who must decide whether to impose compulsory vaccination by law".
    But Anelli added that guilds should hold members to their professional ethical standards and levy sanctions where doctors fell short of them.
    The Rome doctors guild has launched disciplinary proceedings against 13 anti-vaxxer doctors.
    The head of Spallanzani infectious disease institute in Rome, Giuseppe Ippolito, told ANSA that doctors must vaccinate themselves of else face suspension from duty. (ANSA).