President Irfaan Ali takes first dose of COVID vaccine

– urges all Guyanese to get inoculated

His Excellency Dr Irfaan Ali has received his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine and is urging all Guyanese to do the same; the Head of State made this call shortly after his inoculation.

“Fellow Guyanese I’m very pleased to inform you that I took the COVID-19 vaccine. And I want to take this opportunity to encourage every Guyanese to take the vaccine. While it is not mandatory, I want to urge you, as far as possible, to consider taking the vaccine.”

President Ali pointed to the importance of the vaccines in protecting the citizens as well as allowing the country to get ahead of the pandemic.

He once again assured that no resource will be spared in having every single Guyanese vaccinated before the end of the year.

“Only today, I had engagement with the Organization of Islamic Conference.  We continue to reach out directly to suppliers of the Russian vaccine, Sinopharm, Moderna, Pfizer, AstraZeneca. We’ve also reached out to other suppliers in the UAE, because you know it is becoming a global shortage in getting the vaccines itself.”

The President said too that the government is expecting another batch of vaccines shortly, which will be rolled out in a phased manner to Guyanese. “It is important for us to ensure that we explore every avenue, having access to these vaccines in a speedy manner, and ensuring that it fits into our plan of having the entire country vaccinated before the end of the year, so you can rest assured that we will continue to work aggressively on this.”