Turkey now offers booster shots for people aged 18 and over

* Photo: Anadolu Agency (AA) - File

Click to read the article in Turkish

The Health Ministry's Coronavirus Scientific Advisory Board convened via video conference yesterday (November 10). Health Minister Fahrettin Koca has released a written statement after the meeting.

Koca has indicated that the ones in the risk group, the course of the pandemic and vaccination program were on the meeting's agenda.

He has announced that as part of the fight against COVID-19, the ones who have been vaccinated with both doses of an mRNA vaccine (Pfizer-BioNTech), received the second dose at least 6 months ago and aged 18 and over can get an appointment for the third dose as of today.

Sharing data about the COVID-19 cases and deaths, Koca has said that the people aged 60 and over have accounted for 15 percent of the cases in the past month. "However, 84.8 percent of the deaths are among our citizens aged 60 and over," Fahrettin Koca has added.

The Health Minister has called on people to get vaccinated and keep taking protective measures against the virus.

According to Koca, the rate of children in the 8-16 age group (school age) has dropped to 10 percent among all COVID-19 cases.

He has commented that "the fact that the number of cases among the children at school age has been decreasing may have a positive effect on the course of the outbreak," noting that "if the number of daily cases does not see rapid increases, it will keep health facilities' burden controllable."

Speaking about Turkey's COVID-19 vaccine Turcovac, Health Minister Koca has said that 2 thousand of the 3 thousand volunteers necessary to start producing the vaccine have been found. (KÖ/SD)