A few days ago the World Health Organisation (WHO) representative in Ghana had cause to appeal to Ghanaians to get vaccinated.
His appeal comes on the backdrop of the fact that we are nowhere near attaining the herd immunity required to serve as a bastion against COVID-19 and its attendant mutations.
Have the vaccine skeptics not seen how the vaccinations have saved mankind from the claws of the pandemic? Before the arrival of sufficient vaccines from international donors many queried the developed world for not donating vaccines to us. Now that the vaccines are here in abundance the number of persons turning up to get the jab is still below expectation.
Science tells us that the more we vaccinate the more we make it difficult for the virus to mutate. Let us as a country learn from what other countries in the other hemisphere are suffering as a result of vaccine hesitancy.
With the availability of vaccines there is no excuse not to get vaccinated other than sheer indifference and perhaps falling victims to misinformation which has made dangerous rounds.
Let us listen to science and not the baseless apprehension being propagated by persons who know next to nothing about vaccines.
Many countries might although be struggling to have their citizens patronize the vaccination campaign, we should strive to be different.
We call on the authorities to step up the campaign to have as many as possible informed about the vaccination points and the importance of the exercise.
While we express gratitude to the Almighty God for sparing us the many deaths which other countries especially in Europe and the US continue to suffer we nonetheless ask that we disabuse our minds about our somewhat invincibility in the face of the virus. We have lost over a thousand citizens to the virus a number which represents broken hearts in diverse homes.
Government besides stepping up the campaign through awareness creation should consider engaging other institutions such as the church, mosques and others towards having us hit the target the health authorities have set for the country.
The cost of COVID-19 hitting back for daring it through a refusal to patronize the vaccination will be too high.
The misinformation and disinformation are continuing especially in deprived areas where the vulnerable are many.
In the campaigns the authorities should take the pain to present the statistics of the lives claimed by the virus and the implications of the mutation.
We must congratulate the Ghana Health Service for their latest efforts. The Service has started a campaign on social media to encourage all about the availability of the jabs and their locations so as many as possible can avail themselves of the vaccination.