The campaign for Covid-19 booster doses started in Bangladesh today with vaccinating Runu Veronica Costa, a senior nurse of Kurmitola General Hospital who had received the first shot of the Covid-19 vaccine in Bangladesh back in January.
Health Minister Zahid Maleque inaugurated the vaccination drive at Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons in Dhaka's Mohakhali.
Apart from Health Minister Zahid Maleque, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen, Law Minister Anisul Huq, Fisheries Minister SM Rezaul Karim, Director General of Health Directorate Prof ABM Khurshid Alam, National Professor Shajla Khatun, a journalist, a police personnel, and chief of Anjuman Mofidul Islam received booster jabs today.
"It does not matter who has taken which vaccine earlier, initially people aged 60 years and above and frontliners will get only Pfizer vaccine as booster dose. It will start nationwide, likely from next week," Prof Meerjady Sabrina Flora, additional director general of the health directorate, told journalists following the launch of the campaign.
Details will be informed soon once all preparation will be completed, she said.
Citizens aged 60 and above would be eligible for receiving the booster doses. The frontliners who have received both doses of vaccines at least nine months ago would also be eligible.
Gradually, the programme will be expanded all over the country, he said, without sharing further details.
