PM Holness Encourages COVID-19 Vaccination Uptake

Prime Minister Andrew Holness has issued a mandate to Jamaicans already vaccinated, to encourage their family members and friends who are unvaccinated to get the jab. His call comes as the pandemic is creating a clear divide between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated. The Prime Minister was speaking during a tour of a vaccination site in his constituency of St. Andrew west-central on Friday, September 10.

There is hesitancy, fear, misinformation, and even mischievousness among the population, as the national COVID-19 vaccination drive continues. Three brands of vaccine are now available to the public, yet 82.2 percent of the population remains unvaccinated.

Prime Minister Andrew Holness believes one of the main factors contributing to hesitancy is the convenience of the vaccination process. In doing so, PM Holness concedes that more sites need to be open and more vaccinators are needed. PM Holness says he is aware that persons are having spend long waiting hours at the vaccination sites and this is a disruption to their daily task and obligations. He notes that the aim is to reduce the waiting time.

He says the unvaccinated population creates a fertile ground for the virus to thrive. This as cases of the more transmissible and vaccine-resistant variant, Mu have been recorded in the island.

More in this CVM Live story from Robian Williams: