After initially saying that persons who have recovered from COVID-19 should wait before getting vaccinated, Minister of Health Dr Frank Anthony on Friday said that there is no harm in them getting immunised as soon as possible.
During a COVID-19 update, Anthony said that testing for COVID-19 is not a requirement before getting vaccinated but if someone is showing symptoms associated with virus they will be advised to isolate for ten days. He said after they have completed the recovery period, they can decide whether they should get vaccinated. Considering there is no way to tell if an asymptomatic person is infected with COVID-19 outside of a PCR test, he added that there is no harm in administering the vaccine as there might have even been instances where an infected person has been vaccinated and there have been no reports on any harmful effects here to date.
Anthony acknowledged that the World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines had indicated that persons should wait until three months after recovery before getting vaccinated but he added that this was due to the scarcity of vaccines around the world as well as the immunity developed by those who recovered. The WHO has also said that given instances of people becoming infected with COVID-19 a second time, getting vaccinated is even more important.
Meanwhile, Anthony revealed that as of Thursday 136,152 persons had been vaccinated with their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, with 4,675 of that number having already been administered their second dose, making them fully vaccinated. He explained that after receiving the first dose, antibodies will be circulating in the body of the vaccinated and this would further be strengthened by the second day.
Asked whether the country has enough vaccines, Anthony said yes and noted that the government has purchased enough vaccines to administer to the entire population. “There is no shortage,” he stressed.
Anthony reiterated the importance of getting vaccinated, while noting again that residents of Region Ten have not been responding favourably towards the vaccine.
Asked whether the Government will be relaxing COVID-19 measures now that vaccines are available, Anthony said that not enough persons have been vaccinated to achieve herd immunity. He noted that while the United States has begun relaxing measures, millions of persons living there have been vaccinated.
“If we work hard enough and we get more people to take the vaccine, we would get to a point where we can remove those measures but as of now we have to maintain them and continue using them,” he said.
Anthony added that majority of the persons currently infected are either asymptomatic and the 85 persons in institutional isolation have either mild or severe symptoms of the virus.
