Following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic some two years ago, the world adopted measures, including wearing of nose masks, hand hygiene, social distancing and lockdowns to fight it. Vaccination is the latest addition to these measures.
Even though vaccination does not guarantee 100-percent immunity against the disease, medical scientists say it is the most effective way of fighting it.
Herd immunity, or community immunity, is when a large part (at least 60 percent) of the population of an area is immune to the disease and restricts its spread.
However, like in the case of the other measures, many people are against the vaccination for all manner of reasons or excuses.
These ever-emerging conspiracy theories give impetus to the refusal or avoidance of all the COVID-19 safety measures, with the worst case being that of vaccination.
In the circumstances, countries have to adopt strategies to, at least, achieve herd immunity to get some respite to plan what next to do.
For instance,in her article ‘Carrot or Stick? How countries are tackling COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy’ published online on August 2, 2021, Sonia Elks of the Thomson Reuters Foundation
writes among other COVID-19 inducements thatUS President Joe Biden is urging local governments to offer $100 to the newly-vaccinated even though he sees that as unfair to those already vaccinated, whereas Moscow authorities have been handing out five cars in a week in a prize draw for the vaccinated, and 18 to 30-year-olds Britons going to be offered discounted takeaway meals and free travel to their COVID-19 jab centres, Romanians a bar barbeque and a Philippine community had been raffling off huge sacks of rice, after finding it hard to persuade people to get their shots.
Elks continues that there are deterrents such as in Indonesian capital Jakarta where fines of up to 5 million rupiah ($350) are imposed on people who shun vaccination but deterrents seem to be rarer across the globe..
In some countries, people who are not vaccinated will have their access to events or public spaces limited and this one is being used in Ghana in which case people without vaccination cards would not be allowed to enter public buildings.
In the case of inducement, the Ghana Health Service (GHS) has launched a vaccination campaign , ‘National COVID-19 Vaccination Days’, on the theme; “Protect yourself, protect your family. Get vaccinated against COVID-19 now.”
The five-day nationwide campaign to boost the uptake of COVID-19 vaccines and accelerate efforts in attaining herd immunity in the country is scheduled for Wednesday, February 2 to Sunday, February 6, 2022 and targeted at vaccinating at least 2.5 million people to inch the country closer to the goal of having 60 per cent of the population fully vaccinated by the end of March, this year.
The campaign is expected to drive the COVID-19 vaccination henceforth, and allow for the subsequent review of restrictions and help restore life and the economy to normalcy.
Alongside the vaccination, the campaign employs communication and social mobilisation strategies like airing of jingles, vaccination songs, sharing of educative materials, appointment of COVID-19 ambassadors and intensified media programmes, to fight misinformation and misconceptions about the vaccines to promote its safety.
The GHS has appealed to stakeholders to support the vaccination campaign by assisting in advocacy and education on the safety of the vaccines and its importance to protecting lives.
The Ghanaian Times believes that the GHS strategy of going to the people with the vaccines to give them the jabs is a good one and so the whole nation should heed the appeal to help defeat the pandemic.
The benefits of such a defeat is enormous for the good health of Ghanaians and growth of the economy.
