Fighting the Coronavirus in Turkey: Is it time to return to normal life?

In recent days and weeks, the vaccination process in Turkey has accelerated and millions of Turkish and foreign citizens have been vaccinated against the coronavirus.

However, in the past few days, there has been an ups and downs in the number of patients, which once again caused concern for health workers.

Turkish political and economic officials hope that the country will receive at least 12 million foreign tourists in the next three months, given that it is the golden season for tourism.

But the evidence indicates that achieving this desired economic goal is directly related to controlling and combating the spread of the Coronavirus.

What do the statistics say?

In the few days in which Turkish Ministry of Health employees broke the record with more than one million doses of vaccine per day.

The number of new cases fell below 5,000 within 24 hours.

But now many Turkish cities are on the rise again and the number of patients exceeds 5,000 per day.

Here are the latest statistics published by Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca to the media:

• The number of tests in 24 hours is 223 thousand cases.
• The number of new patients within 24 hours is 5,630 patients.
• 56 deaths in the last 24 hours.
• The total number of examinations since the beginning until today is 59 million 668 thousand cases.
• The total number of patients from the beginning until today reached 5 million and 399 thousand people.
• The total number of people recovered is 5 million 262 thousand people.
• Patients in difficult conditions 737 people.
• The total number of deaths from the virus reached 49,473.

According to the information published by the Turkish Ministry of Health. The country is in an appropriate position in terms of accelerating the vaccination process against the Coronavirus.

And the latest information regarding vaccination is as follows:

• The total number of injected vaccines is 46 million 590 thousand 23 people.
• People who received the first dose: 31 million 799 thousand 678 people.
• People who received both doses: 14 million 790 thousand 345 people.

Turkey has a population of 83 million, excluding approximately 5 million foreign nationals.

According to the statistics of vaccinators and the number of vaccinations per day, it can be said that in the next two weeks, half of the total population of Turkey will receive two doses of the Coronavirus vaccine.

And in this regard, the Ministry of Health of this country has an excellent and defensible record.

Statistics show that Turkish health authorities have preferred that the vaccination process be faster in urban and tourist areas.

Accordingly, the statistics of injected doses in several governorates are as follows:

• Istanbul: 8 million and 550 thousand doses.
• Ankara: 3 million and 865 thousand doses.
• Izmir: 3 million and 120 thousand doses.
• Bursa: 1 million and 808 thousand doses.
• Antalya: 1 million and 573 thousand doses.

Turkey has used Chinese, Russian, German and English vaccines so far.

And according to media reports, the purchase of 50 million doses of the Chinese vaccine is the most important contract to purchase this vaccine.

Turkey has also reached the final stage of trials for its national vaccine, called Turkovac.

On Wednesday, the Turkish Minister of Health announced a contract to purchase 120 million doses of the Biontech vaccine.

In the past 10 days, Turkey, along with countries such as the United States, China, Canada, the United Kingdom, India, Brazil, Germany, France and Italy, has been ranked in the world’s top-tier vaccine league.

Where mobile groups were sent to vaccinate the disabled and the elderly at home.

Artists and celebrities also supported the vaccination process in Turkey by publishing messages on social media.

Special teams have also been formed in order to persuade the elderly to take the vaccine.

In addition to undertaking several initiatives to speed up vaccination in Turkey.

Turkey’s fear of mutated delta

The delta version of the coronavirus, which first emerged in India, has been seen in 80 countries in the past three weeks.

The World Health Organization, which names major mutated strains of the coronavirus based on the Greek alphabet, named the version in India as Delta.

The virus has spread widely in Britain and Germany, and cases have been reported in Russia.

Therefore, the spread of the delta mutation of the Coronavirus in these countries has alarmed some Turkish scientists and experts.

Professor Omid Savaş, a faculty member at the Turkish Coronavirus Headquarters, said that delta mutations have been observed in at least 16 of Turkey’s 81 provinces and that 134 people have been diagnosed with this version of the virus.

Professor Omid Savaş believes that in order to bypass the delta mutant, the Turkish Ministry of Health must inject more than one million vaccines every day for the next four weeks.

Provincial health directors must not allow the vaccination acceleration rate to be lower than this.

Do tourists bring viruses?

In the past few days, Turkish Foreign Ministry officials managed to persuade countries such as Germany, Britain and Russia to send tourists after the talks.

Meanwhile, the most important customer of Turkish tourism are Russian citizens, who in the first days of the resumption of flights, an average of 14,000 people, traveled to the Turkish city of Antalya daily.

The return of tourists has brought happiness to the government and the private sector.

But in the meantime, there are many media and experts who have expressed their concerns about this issue.

They believe that in the current psychological environment caused by the market stagnation, the tolerance of foreign national travel, can be dangerous in the outbreak of the virus again.

In the end, it must be said that providing the vaccine and managing the vaccination process in cities and villages is a vital and important step.

However, the role of human societies and people from different countries is still more important than any other factor.

And if all health protocols, social distancing and the use of masks are simultaneously ignored, not even mass vaccination can be effective on its own.