The Ghana Health Services will soon announce days for nationwide immunisation against COVID-19 infections in the country, the Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, has announced.
To be known as the national vaccination day, the five-day activity which is scheduled to take place between February 2 and 6 will among other things ensure mass immunisation of majority of the citizenry.
The decision to announce national immunisation day forms part of a revised policy on vaccines by the government.
It is aimed at helping the country to deal with the pandemic and ensure that herd immunity is attained.
The Minister announced this in Accra yesterday at the Minister’s Briefing series organised by the Ministry of Information.
He said about 34.8 per cent of the 20 million population target as of now had at least received a single dose of the vaccine with about 16.1 per cent people being fully vaccinated.
On his part, the Director-General of the GHS, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, explained that over 25million doses of vaccines had so far been received with COVAX contributing about 68.2 per cent.
He explained that the country had so far recorded about 155,242 confirmed cases out of the 2.2million persons tested with over 149,693 recoveries.
Furthermore, he said a total of 1,364 deaths had been recorded with the current active cases standing at 4,185 out of which 40 were severe and 11 critically ill.
Dr Kuma-Aboagye noted that even though the country was currently experiencing the fourth wave of the pandemic, the proportion of critical and severe cases were relatively low.
Similarly, he said there had been significant reduction in the active cases over the last few weeks with the downward trend in international arrivals.
Dr Kuma-Aboagye said as part of the revised vaccine policy, the government had approved for booster doses to be administered to all Frontline Health workers, security personnel, persons with underlying health conditions, persons 60years and above and members of the Executive, Legislature and the Judiciary.
Also the policy had recommended that Pfizer and Modena Vaccines to be given to pregnant women and children between the ages of 15 and 17 years.
BY CLIFF EKUFUL
