Omicron: Vaccinated persons are immune to new COVID variant – GHS

In an interview with 3FM on Monday, November 29, the 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 also revealed that Ghana has not yet recorded any case of the new variant, Omicron.

“We have the system to detect if it is reported in Ghana,” he assured Ghanaians.

He also urged Ghanaians and 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.”

Meanwhile, the Director-General of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Patrick Kumah-Aboagye, has also opined that authorities are going to scale up surveillance measures at the Kotoka International Airport during the Christmas season to ensure that COVID infections do not increase.

Speaking at a press conference in Accra on Sunday November 28, Dr Kumah-Aboagye further said that the mistakes that were made in December last year which occasioned the escalation of infections in January this year, will not be repeated.

There is going to be a “strict enforcement of the protocols at the KIA. We are going to increase surveillance. We are expecting an increased number of people to arrive in the country.

“We are going to ensure that our logistics are prepared, we will continue our surveillance to be able to look at that, we are going to look at isolation centres,” he said.