A red flowers bouquet and the Christmas sweet bread were the symbolic holiday gifts for the frontline doctors, nurses and other medical workers at the infectious disease hospital at the University Hospital Centre in Tirana as a token appreciation and immense gratitude for the dedication and human sacrifice in the name of life.

The physical distance, a rule recently applied like never before, is no barrier for us to express through simple gestures the respect for the frontline doctors and nurses at COVID-designated hospitals for becoming the embodiment of this Renaissance holiday because of their sublime sacrifice and the relentless struggle against death.

As such it was the wish and the popular Christmas flowers bouquet the Prime Minister Edi Rama place at the hospital yard at a spontaneous meeting with the infectious diseases hospital doctors on duty as every day over the past ten months since the coronavirus pandemic outbreak.

“We are here to extend our Christmas wishes. We have also brought a symbolic Christmas present. We are extremely grateful and we feel the greatest respect for you. It is really a huge work and tremendous sacrifice. It happened what actually happens once in 100 years, and you are shouldering the burden of this fight, which you will apparently successfully cope with and it will subsist in your personal lives as an extraordinary heroic moment, of which, you will be proud for yourself and your colleagues and families, and Albania will also be very proud of you. So, again I would like to wish all the best to each and every one of you and may you keep on contributing as much as you can by putting your hearts and minds in all this,” PM Rama said.

The Minister of Health and Social Protection, Ogerta Manastirliu, also gratitude to all the heroic doctors, nurses, paramedics and medical staff for working tirelessly during these unprecedented 10 months, since start of COVID-19 pandemic. “Merry Christmas everyone! Indeed, just a small part of doctors, nurses and medical workers at the infectious diseases hospital are attending this meeting, as it is of course impossible for every doctor and nurse serving at the COVID 3, COVID 4 and COVID 2 hospitals, who have done and are doing heroic job, full of dedication and professionalism during this unprecedented year. We hope a better year will come and everyone will enjoy great health. I would like to personally extend my most heartfelt wishes for good health, happiness and success also for your families in the coming year. We will be always together. Together we will succeed in this very difficult moment, just like we have done all over these years, which haven’t been easy at all, although the last 10 months have been the toughest ones, when we have been facing major challenges. Thank you very much and gratitude for each and every one of you!” Manastirliu said.

But in addition to the best Christmas and New Year holiday wishes, PM Rama and Health Minister also gave very good news to the doctors and nurses at the infectious diseases hospital. “It looks like this building will end its mission gloriously, because a new infectious diseases hospital will be built once this war is over,” PM Rama said, giving the floor to the Health Minister to announce that “with World Bank loan approved, the infectious disease hospital has been included in the government’s reconstruction plans to deliver much higher standards.”

“Next year, hoping that the pandemic’s height will gradually diminish and hoping that we won’t have to cope with a surge in fresh infections, since the vaccine, which we expect to be delivered early next year, will certainly help to improve the situation. However, this doesn’t mean that the invisible enemy won’t be with us, because we will have to move on cautiously by respecting the mask use rule and the social distancing  until we return to the normalcy everyone wishes to happen as soon as possible,” Health Minister said.

Humorously, PM Rama added:”A ceremony will be held to mark the end of this war. Professor Najada Çomo and Tritan Kalo will both push the detonation button to implode this building and kick-start the work to construct this facility, which represents one of the final parts to be constructed at the University Hospital Centre.”

Securing the COVID-19 vaccine is the next step the government is set to take to go on with the fight against the novel coronavirus. To this end, PM Rama dwelled upon the issue to explain that doctors are the first contingent to benefit protection through the vaccine.

“I am careful about what I say, but we are close to finalizing the agreement on the vaccine deliveries with several components. Therefore, I am confident that the initial vaccine doses will be delivered early next year. And by no doubt these first doses will be administered to physicians and other frontline health care workers. So, I believe, it is a matter of weeks before you receive the vaccine and we will accelerate the process then. It is actually a difficult situation as even the most powerful countries are receiving much less vaccine deliveries than what they had planned initially and this is because the United States is the country where the vaccine is being produced and the US President has decided to ban export of any vaccine dose. The rest of the manufacturing part outside US is producing much less quantities and this remains a problem for now. I have communicated with a number of prime ministers over the past days and they are yet unable to release to the public accurate figures on the vaccine deliveries, because the quantity of the vaccines is much less than what they had promises and this is not because they were uninformed, but because the information they had has actually changed due to the dynamics. We have established communication with several states, because the agreements are now reached between states and despite the agreement with Pfizer company, we are inching towards an accord with Astrazeneca for the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid vaccine which will hopefully be approved this year. We are also involved in discussions with Moderna, but this company produces only a small quantity of vaccines outside the United States. Not only that, but the state should reach agreements with other states. Most recently we have come across the case of North Macedonia, but it is about just 100 vaccine doses that Bulgaria has affirmed it will deliver to North Macedonia, just like it will do for us. We haven’t announced this earlier, because it is primarily an expression of kindness, but it is not a fact, and, secondly, we did not want to make comments in advance, but we are very close to securing the initial vaccine deliveries. We are very confident that the vaccine will be available for the teams of COVID-designated hospitals very soon. The vaccination process will then certainly go on. Together with the Health Minister we have already embarked on designing a plan to deploy all the teams that will administer the vaccines at the Air Albania stadium. This is because it is supposed that using large outdoor spaces would help in maintaining controlled queues. We are preparing a very good project and the infrastructure will be installed by early weeks of January. The frontline doctors and nurses will receive the vaccine very soon, and the process will then gradually continue to include all medical workers, teachers, police workers who are in contact with people and the deliveries will grow in March and April to allow us to secure and administer more vaccines deliveries and I am confident that the vaccine deliveries will grow as the production process is progressing rapidly and a surplus production will soon be available,” the Premier told doctors and nurses.