THE Ministry of Health is set to launch booster dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to provide better protection against the viral disease.
Minister for Health Ms Ummy Mwalimu revealed that yesterday when presenting her report on budget implementation for her docket in a period between July and December last year to the Parliamentary Committee on Social Services and Community Development in Dodoma.
The ministry will in the near future launch booster dosage of Covid-19 vaccine to enable citizens to get better protection against the disease,” Ms Mwalimu said.
She added that the exercise of getting the booster dosage will be voluntary.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), booster doses are administered to a vaccinated population that has completed a primary vaccination series (currently one or two doses of Covid-19 vaccine depending on the product) when, with time, the immunity and clinical protection has fallen below a rate deemed sufficient in that population.
The objective of a booster dose is to restore vaccine effectiveness from that deemed no longer sufficient.
The minister further detailed that in the period between July and December last year the ministry in collaboration with other stakeholders managed to provide full Covid-19 vaccine to Tanzanians aged 18 and above thus reaching 86 per cent of the targeted population.
“Within six months we have done well in vaccination exercise against Covid-19 … we have managed to reach 86 per cent of Tanzanians aged 18 years and above compared to 24.7 per cent recorded in June 2022,” said Ms Mwalimu.
He added that until December 31 last year the government had received a total of 46,848,520 doses of which 41,581,670 doses had already been distributed across the country. The remaining 5,266,850 doses stored at the Medical Store Department (MSD) are of Johnson & Johnson type.
Speaking on children vaccines, Minister Ummy said that the services are still available to children under one year of age ( Pentavalent 3 vaccine) to attain 107 per cent coverage compared to 96 per cent attained in 2021.
She noted that the provision of Polio vaccine -OPV3 has been successful in all four rounds by 103 per cent compared to 79 per cent attained in 2021.
She said Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) has been attained by 107 per cent compared to 95 per cent in 2021 while the first dose for Measles and Rubella has been covered by 109 per cent compared to 92 per cent in 2021 while the second dose has covered 96 per cent compared to 2021.
In December last year, Minister Ummy said that the sixth phase government under President Dr Samia Suluhu Hassan the health sector made great strides in improving provision of health services in the country.
She said the government managed to improve health services from the grassroots (dispensary) to the national level, as well as strengthening the availability of medicines in the Medical Stores Department (MSD), including buying modern medical equipment such as CT SCAN machines for all regional referral hospitals in the country.
The minister further added that the ministry managed to increase the number of health workers at all levels in line with the Samia Super Specialisation Health Programme.
The programme is aimed at addressing the shortage of health specialists and super specialists, something which was forcing the government to incur high costs by sending the patients abroad.
She said this year the ministry will continue improving and strengthening the quality of health services in the country including encouraging the introduction of Universal Health Insurance (UHI).
