The ministry of health has revealed that Ghana will start giving COVID-19 booster doses to some selected members of the population.
Addressing the media in Accra on Wednesday (19 January), Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, the Minister of health said the “national immunisation technical advisory group (NITAG), proposed the following key recommendations to booster doses; which have been endorsed. As the initial COVID-19 vaccine diplomacy strategy, NITAG proposed that the under listed segmented population should have boosters; health care workers, persons with underlined medical conditions, persons 60 years and above, frontline security personnel, members of the executive, judiciary and legislator.”
“…On the issue of vaccine mandate, we’ll be focusing on some selected persons and venues while we get a reasonable number of Ghanaians vaccinated. And in view of this, we are planning to have national COVID-19 vaccination days to boost the coverage among the general population,” he added.
Vaccinating pregnant women
Pregnant women in Ghana can now be vaccinated against the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ghana Health Service (GHS) announced on Wednesday (19 January).
According to the GHS, recent studies across the globe including Ghana show that pregnant women are now safe to take the COVID-19 jab.
Speaking at a media briefing on Wednesday, the director-general of the GHS, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye said specific vaccines will be administered to pregnant women.
“We have done quite a lot of work. We at Ghana Health Service and all the other agencies who are working with us, we are all concerned about pregnant women, that is why we didn’t add them in the first one year of implementation.
“But now that we have enough evidence both international and local, we are now able to add pregnant women to it because it is effective and safe. There are studies in Ghana, we are collaborating, which we are even looking at effect on breastfeeding and so far it is safe, and that is why we are adding that to it,” Kuma-Aboagye said.
He added: “And then we have also recommended specific vaccines that can be used for pregnant women, just like we have specific ones for 15 year olds, those below 18 and 15 years.”
Dr Kuma-Aboagye said the GHS will embark on massive education across the country on vaccinating pregnant women in the coming days.