The Ghana Health Service (GHS) has assured that those who have already taken the COVID-19 vaccine should not be scared of being attacked by the new variant of COVID-19, ‘Omicron’.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says it is not yet clear if Omicron causes more severe disease.
Even though Ghana has not recorded any case of omicron which was discovered in South Africa, health experts say it is important to protect our territories.
Many countries have banned flights to and from South Africa of which its President Cyril Ramaphosa has called on countries to “urgently” reverse “scientifically unjustified” travel bans linked to the discovery of the new coronavirus variant, Omicron.
In an interview with 3FM’s Sunrise on Monday hosted by Alfred Ocansey, Manager of the Expanded Programme on Immunization at the Ghana Health Service, Dr. Kwame Amponsah-Achiano said “the vaccine can protect the omicron…the new variant”.
“The vaccine improves your immune system so you are better off vaccinated than not being vaccinated because those who have been vaccinated are immune. Do not fear”.
Dr. Amponsah-Achiano who is also the Coordinator of the vaccination exercise assured that “we have the system to detect if it is reported in Ghana”.
December month for vaccination
He urged corporate bodies to take advantage of the declaration of the month of December as vaccination to ensure their staff are vaccinated.
“Send the request to the district health directorate and they would make arrangements. That is what we have been doing. What they have to do is to know which districts they are in and write to them”.
Vaccination mandatory?
Dr. Amposah-Achiano said “It is not compulsory but if you don’t get the vaccine, you may not be allowed to enter certain places. At the schools, we wrote to the schools who also wrote to the parents for their consents before vaccinating the students”.
He added “if the parents decide they do not want their child to be vaccinated, then it means something else would happen. There may be some consequences. It is not that the child would be caught and vaccinated”.
