Vaccination Programme

This information has been obtained from afpop (Portugal Foreign Residents Association)

Vaccine programme – Private health care: We have more information now for those people who are registered with the state healthcare system (SNS), but who use the private medical system for treatments and who may have ailments that should be taken into account when calling people for vaccinations.

The first thing for private healthcare patients to note, is that if they are registered with the SNS and have no health issues which will cause them to be in a higher risk category, they need to do nothing and will be called by the SNS according to their age. The criteria for higher risk categories in the vaccination phases are included below. This link will help you discover what phase you are currently included in for vaccinations. https://covid19estamoson.gov.pt/simualacao-fase-vacinacao

If you do have any of the conditions in the list below, you should contact your doctor and arrange a consultation. The doctor will then issue you with a document, in Portuguese, for you to take to the nearest Centro de Saúde for input into the SNS system. There is no need to ask for a doctor’s appointment at the Centro de Saúde as far as we are informed and if you do ask for a doctor’s appointment and are not ill, you will probably be refused. However, once your details are registered you may be asked to go to see the doctor, but that will be decided by them. I suggest that you explain when you call or email them for the appointment, that you have a report from your private doctor that needs to be updated in the SNS system for the purpose of early vaccination and then follow their instructions.

If your Centro de Saúde is not accepting visitors, then you should consult this website https://bicsp.min-saude.pt/pt/biufs/Paginas/default.aspx In the three boxes at the top, you will see ARS, ACES and UF. These are drop down boxes and you select the region in the first (ARS) box, for example ARS Algarve, then in the second (ACES) box select the area, for example ACES 1 – Algarve Central and then the town in the 3rd (UF) box. This will then give you a list on the right-hand side of the page of the health centres that you can use and the contact details.

When you visit the health centre, make sure you have your personal identification, social security number (if you have one) and fiscal number with you as well as your Cartão de Utente/Número de Utente.

Vaccination phases:

Phase 1. From February 2021

People over the age of 50 with the following health conditions:
  • Cardiac insufficiency
  • Coronary Illness
  • Kidney disease
  • COPD and chronic respiratory problems requiring mechanical ventilation and or using oxygen permanently.

Phase 2 from April 2021

People over the age of 65 who have not been vaccinated previously;
People between the ages of 50 and 64 years of age, who have at least one of the following illnesses
  • Diabetes
  • Cancer sufferers
  • Chronic renal failure (GFR higher than > 60ml/min)
  • Liver failure
  • High blood pressure
  • Obesity
  • Other underlying illnesses that fall into this category not yet defined.
Phase 3 will commence once phase 2 is completed.

Registering for Cartão and Nº Utente:
If you are Resident and not yet registered with the SNS, you must do so in order to be included in the vaccination programme. You need to contact them and arrange an appointment, after which you will be issued a document called Cartão de Utente, that will have your State health care number, also known as Nº Utente or Nº SNS.

Non-residents: We are still waiting for responses to our questions about non-residents and what to do if they are here in Portugal and if they can be vaccinated here. There are people who came to their property in Portugal and can’t return to their home country, but at the moment we still have no information about whether there will be any facility for those people to be included in the Portuguese vaccination programme.

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