Half-a-million jabs in arms
Jamaica has administered more than half-a-million doses of COVID-19 vaccines, as the island continues efforts to vaccinate 65 per cent of the population against the deadly disease by March 2022.
The ministry of health said that 500,605 doses were administered as of Thursday evening, 359,675 of which were first doses, and 139,242 were second doses. The remainder were single dose shots.
The Government has said that the inoculation of a large portion of the population against COVID-19 is critical in the fight against the virus that has only slowed the economy and has threatened to bring the health sector to its knees.
On Wednesday, the island recorded 463 new COVID-19 infections and confirmed 22 deaths. The new cases moved the total number of infections to 64,294 since the first case was recorded last year while the death toll climbed to 1,453.
Jamaica has received more than one million (1,139,140) doses of AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer vaccines for use of the island.
“In the last four weeks alone, we received more than 820,000 of those doses. This is in keeping with the inflows we had predicted, with more to come,” said Dr Christopher Tufton, the minister of health and wellness.
“The vaccines are here. What we need to do is to make good use of them. I am encouraged by the uptake over the last week and urge those who have not yet been vaccinated to make every effort to do so,” the minister added.