On Wednesday, Czech Republic Health Minister Jan Blatny announced that the country will have around 200 COVID-19 vaccination centres in healthcare facilities, with 5,000 doctors that will be vaccinating people in their clinics. Blatny stated that the first batch of vaccine should arrive throughout the festive season. 

"We should have been convincing the people for a long time that the solution to this terrible situation that all of us are experiencing this year is vaccination. Only vaccination," Prime Minister Andrej Babis said in the Chamber of Deputies. 

When stating its plans, the Czech Republic authorities confirmed that medical personnel from hospitals will be vaccinated first.  

Babis continued, "The Health Ministry has a clear order -- the vaccine will arrive to the storeroom, be distributed to all regions, there will be cars from individual regions waiting, they will deliver it and the vaccination will finally begin.” 

This month, people at the Prague-Motol University Hospital and the General Teaching Hospital will be vaccinated, from the first 1,204 doses received. 

The following vaccinations will be distributed to 29 centres afterwards. 

Babis was criticised by member of the Central Crisis Staff, MP Vit Kankovsky, who suggested that Czech Republic is not very well prepared for the vaccination.

“A country with a population of 10.7 million is slated to get the vaccine for 6.9 million people in total. The Czech vaccination strategy reckons with vaccines for one million people in the first quarter of 2021, for 2.62 million in the second quarter, for 2.42 million in the third quarter, and for 0.38 million in the fourth one.”