Dr Anthony Nsiah-Asare, Presidential Advisor on Health
Presidential Advisor on Health, Dr Anthony Nsiah-Asare has said the government’s target of vaccinating about 20 million people this year has not changed.
He explained in an interview with Alfred Ocansey on the Sunrise show on 3FM Wednesday, July 14 that more vaccines are being made available because most of the manufacturing countries have inoculated the majority of their populations.
“Yes, we stand by it,” he said when asked whether the government is still aiming at that target.
He added “When you aim high then it pushes you to do what you are supposed to do.
“The reason why I say we stand by it is that yes, there has been steps taken towards the acquisition of vaccines. The manufacturing countries have vaccinated a lot of their people.
“You go to UK, you go to the US they have vaccinated almost 60 to 70 per cent of their populations. So there are more vaccines which are in the system which they are giving out.
“I believe that in this third and fourth quarter we will have enough vaccines coming into the country. Very soon we are getting another batch of vaccines”
In March this year, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said the government was on course to procuring 42 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccines to achieve its targeting 20 million vaccinated Ghanaians by the end of the year.
He said with the procurement of the vaccines, it is expected that the Ghanaian adult population would be vaccinated.
Mr Akufo-Addo mentioned this in his address at the 11th quadrennial delegates congress of the Trade Union Congress (TUC), Tuesday, 23 March, 2021, at Ejisu in the Ashanti region on the theme: “75 years of TUC: Building stronger union in a challenging world of work”.
He said: “So far, nearly 500,000 persons have been vaccinated and the government is on course to procuring a total of 42 million vaccines to achieve the target of vaccinating 20 million Ghanaians by the end of the year. This will mean the entire adult population of our country would have been vaccinated by the end of the year”.
Ghana’s mass vaccination exercise against the coronavirus pandemic began Tuesday, 2 March, 2021, with some 600,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines.