Dr. Anthony urges vaccination of adolescents before school reopens

With plans by the Ministry of Education to fully reopen schools after the Easter holiday, Minister of Health, Dr. Frank Anthony, M.P., has reiterated the importance of adolescent vaccination.  

He said while it is important for children to return to school, there are still a number of active cases in the country. As such, getting vaccinated is one way for them to be protected while at school.

“Vaccines are available and it is astonishing that you have something that can help reduce the severity of COVID and we still have hesitancy where parents are not allowing their children to come forward and get vaccinated.

So again, one way of returning safety to school is for children to be vaccinated and maybe, before the reopening, it would be a good time for parents to make sure that their children get vaccinated,” he said.

Dr. Anthony added that the ministry will continue to put measures in place to monitor the pandemic here.

Regarding the five to eleven age group, the health minister is encouraging parents to ensure their child/ children continue to observe the COVID-19 measures that were instituted before they were eased, to better protect them against the disease.

“We are working to access those vaccines and once children return to school the idea is that they should wear a mask and do sanitising and so forth…so we’ll encourage parents to adopt those measures,” the minister said.

He said the low vaccination rate for adolescents is not “encouraging” as such he is urging parents to get their children vaccinated.

Additionally, the health minister noted that approximately 15 percent of the total number of cases recorded in Guyana were children under 19-years-old.

As of today, the ministry has administered 34, 193 or 46.9 percent first dose vaccination to the 12 to 17 age cohort while 24, 832 or 34 percent are now fully vaccinated.