The Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) has begun the vaccination of its staff against the novel corona virus (COVID-19) on Friday, March 12, 2021.
This comes at the back of government’s efforts to ensure that about 17 million Ghanaians are vaccinated against the pandemic by June this year.
The exercise was held at the premises of the Authority at Shiashie in Accra.
The Director-General of the GSA, Prof. Alex Dodoo, in a brief remark, said that the vaccination exercise will augment efforts by the government in fighting the pandemic.
“The vaccination is one of the surest ways of getting out of the pandemic in addition to existing COVID-19 protocols. The vaccine is a very wise public health investment and would help reduce the spread of infections ” he stated.
He allayed the fears of the public in undertaking the vaccination exercise saying the vaccines are safe and encouraged all Ghanaians to participate in the exercise.
“Before any vaccine is put on the market they go through rigorous tests to ensure that the benefits outweighs the risk they pose. I will encourage everyone who is qualified to avail themselves for the opportunity to get vaccinated,” Prof Dodoo noted.
The Head of Human Resource at the GSA Boatemaa Manu-Antwi, also encouraged the staff to avail themselves for the exercise so that the Authority can have a healthy workforce to carry out its mandate of developing standards and facilitating trade to testing and conformity assessment activities.
Ghana became the first country to receive the COVID-19 vaccine from the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access Facility (COVAX) in February this year.
According to the Ghana Health Service, more than 300,000 people have taken the AstraZeneca vaccine since its introduction in Ghana earlier this month.