AP PHOTOS: Vaccine teams do house calls for Rome's homebound

ROME (AP) — The doctor and nurse manage just 12 shots a day — six in the morning, six in the afternoon — visiting Rome’s home-bound elderly to administer COVID-19 vaccines and, with them, the hope that Italy’s most fragile might soon emerge from the pandemic.

It's a time-consuming but crucial part of the vaccination campaign in Italy, which has the world’s second-oldest population and tends to care for its aged at home rather than in institutional facilities.

In the Lazio region around Rome, some 30,000 people over age 75 and with conditions that made it impossible for them to get to vaccination centers requested a house call. On Tuesday, a dozen of them got their second dose of Pfizer-BioNTech thanks to Dr. Elisa Riccitelli and nurse Luigi Lauri.

To make sure they hit all their appointments on time — one vial of Pfizer for the morning six, one vial for the afternoon — the local public health center struck a deal with Uber so its visiting vaccination teams could have a dedicated car and driver. The 500 free rides from Uber cut down on time spent finding parking spots in Rome’s notoriously congested streets.

And when they ring a doorbell, they are welcomed inside like heroes.

“It’s really a very nice feeling,” Riccitelli said. “We often vaccinate bedridden patients who cannot move, the extremely elderly, so the feeling is that we’re doing something really useful.”

Italy’s vaccination campaign got off to a slow start due to delivery shortages and logistical hiccups. But the pace is accelerating — to date 18.2 million shots have been administered — and officials hope to reach 500,000 a day, with a goal of vaccinating 80% of the population by September.

Lazio is doing better than many regions, administering just under 2 million shots. Appointments have opened up for...