More than 52,000 persons in Guyana have been inoculated with their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine with about 60 already receiving their second dose, according to Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony.
During an update on Friday, Anthony noted that the COVID-19 vaccination programme has been going quite well, especially over the preceding four days, with an average of 4,500 persons getting vaccinated daily. He disclosed that when mass vaccination started only around 2,000 persons were being vaccinated per day countrywide. However, over the past days there has been a big improvement in the numbers.
Anthony further disclosed that as of Thursday approximately 52,554 persons had received their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Three COVID-19 vaccines are currently available in Guyana—AstraZeneca, China’s Sinopharm and Russia’s Sputnik V. All are double dose vaccines.
The second doses have to be administered several weeks after persons received their first dose. The second dose of the AstraZenca vaccine has to be administered within eight to twelve weeks while the second doses of the Sinopharm and the Sputnik V vaccines have to be administered within 28 days.
Rollout of the Sinopharm vaccine began in early March, making persons who were inoculated with the vaccines eligible to receive their second dose. Anthony revealed that as of Thursday, about 60 persons have received their second dose but these persons have to wait until after seven days before they are considered fully immunized.
Anthony previously encouraged persons who were inoculated with the Sinopharm vaccine to ensure that they receive their second dose within the stipulated timeline.
Further, Anthony said now that they have started to utilise the Sputnik V vaccines, persons will begin receiving their second doses soon. So far, between 2,000 and 2,500 have received their first dose of this particular vaccine.
The minister said that the government is expecting another batch of the Sputnik V vaccines next week.
Meanwhile, Anthony reiterated the importance of getting vaccinated, while noting that if herd immunity is not achieved the Guyanese population will remain vulnerable to COVID-19. He explained that if majority of the population is immunised, there will be little transmission of the virus as a majority would have some form of immunity against COVID-19.
He added that not everyone is required to be immunised and noted that none of the available COVID-19 vaccines can prevent infection but they do reduce the severity of the virus if someone who is vaccinated gets infected.
