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, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, the Minister of Health said the key recommendations to facilitate the booster doses have been approved, paving the way for its deployment.
He disclosed that certain categories of the Ghanaian population should have boosters “national immunization 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.”
Kwaku Agyemang Manu also revealed that plans are being discussed to have national vaccination days to boost the coverage of vaccinated persons in the country.
“…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 a national COVID-19 vaccination day to boost the coverage among the general population,” he added.
The Minister for Health announced revised de-isolation and discharge guidelines for international arrivals at the Kotoka International Airport (KIA).
The Minister said under the revised guidelines, Ghanaians and Resident Foreigners who were partially vaccinated or unvaccinated on arrival would be exempted from full vaccinations before traveling to Ghana.
“As part of the implementation challenges of the testing and isolation policy at the KIA, it was recommended that Ghanaians who were partially vaccinated or unvaccinated be exempted from the directive
requiring full vaccination of passengers travelling to Ghana and be vaccinated on or quarantined mandatorily on arrival,” he said.
Mr Agyeman-Manu said the exempted persons would, however, be offered vaccination on arrival and passengers who failed to receive a jab on arrival would undergo mandatory quarantine for seven days at their own cost.
The Minister stated that for all patients on home isolation, de-isolation would be seven days after testing positive and all hospitalized patients without symptoms will de-isolate ten days after testing positive.
Taking his turn, the Director-General of the GHS, Dr Patrick Kuma- Aboagye announced that pregnant women can now be vaccinated against the COVID-19 pandemic in Ghana.
According to the GHS, recent studies across the globe including Ghana show that pregnant women are now safe to take the COVID-19 jab.
The Director-General of the GHS, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye said specific vaccines will be administered to pregnant women. Dr Kuma-Aboagye said the GHS will embark on massive education across the
country on vaccinating pregnant women in the coming days.
“We have done quite a lot of work. We at Ghana Health Service and all the other agencies who are working with us, are all concerned about pregnant women, that is why we didn’t add them in the first 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,”
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.”
By:Isaac Clottey
