Guyana has 902 active COVID-19 cases across the country, Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony said today. He noted that Regions Four, Six and Three account for most of the infections with 397, 240 and 123 respectively. The Health Official also disclosed that “about 50” new cases were recorded within the last 24 hours.
Regarding vaccination, the Minister reported that 406,748 adults received a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, representing 79.3% of the over-18 population. Meanwhile, 287,362 received both jabs, taking the rate to 56%. This means that 56 out of every 100 citizens have been fully vaccinated to date.
Dr Anthony further reported that 29,807 persons between the ages of 12 and 17 have received a first jab and 21,045 taking both doses. These represent 40.9% and 28.9% respectively. So far, 6,425 booster shots have been administered.
The Minister is urging Guyanese to get vaccinated, while reiterating the need for the country to achieve herd immunity.
“The big challenge now is to get these numbers up as high as possible. Their basically, two ways of getting to herd immunity: either everyone gets sick, and you develop some immunity to the virus, but if you go that route, we’ll get a lot of people getting severely ill and you’ll also have persons dying. So, this is something we want to avoid, so we want to give full protection…And the best way of doing so is to give them a vaccine,” the official noted.
