LISBON, Portugal: At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Portugal’s healthcare system was about to collapse, with hospitals in the capital, Lisbon, overflowing and authorities asking patients to care for themselves at home.

With the country’s vaccination program in complete disarray, the government turned to former submariner Vice Admiral Henrique Gouveia e Melo.

After eight months, Portugal is now one of the world’s leading countries in vaccination rates, with some 86 percent of its population being fully vaccinated.

According to Melo, some 98 percent of those eligible to be vaccinated, or anyone over the age of 12, are fully vaccinated.

“We believe we have reached the point of group protection and near herd immunity. Things look very good,” he said, as reported by Yahoo news.

After a considerable drop in new daily cases to some 650 and few deaths, Portugal suspended almost all of its COVID-19 restrictions on Friday.

Many Western countries have reached a plateau, with more than 20 percent of their populations still unvaccinated, so their governments are looking to Portugal for possible ideas.

However, the continuing global spread of the Delta variant could reverse Portugal’s progress, and there has been worrying information from Israel and other countries indicating protection offered by vaccines decreases over time, amidst a worldwide debate on booster shots.

Melo said Portugal could soon start offering booster shots to older people and other vulnerable categories.

Like many countries, misinformation about vaccines has been present on Portuguese social media accounts, and there was widespread doubt about the effectiveness of vaccines when they first became available.

Melo has been credited with turning this misinformation around, after being appointed head of the national vaccination task force in February. “The first thing is to make this thing a war,” he said in an interview.

Before the pandemic, Portugal had a robust national vaccination program that was established after a devastating experience battling polio.

Therefore, vaccine doubters and anti-vaxxers are in the minority in Portugal, said anthropologist Manuela Ivone da Cunha, who studied anti-vaccination movements.

But not everyone supports Melo’s approach.

“We do not really have a culture of questioning authorities,” said clinical psychologist Laura Sanches, who criticized Portugal’s mass vaccination drive as being too militaristic, according to Yahoo news.

However, the country’s public messaging campaign has made progress.

“At the start, we had some 40% who were unsure,” Melo said adding, according to current polls, only 2.2 percent do not want to get vaccinated.