The President Nana Akufo-Addo is optimistic that Ghana will be able to vaccinate about 20 million individuals by the end of the first quarter of 2022.

“Access to vaccines has been growing. I think by the end of this year, projections are that we would have received some 15 million vaccines. That 20 million target we may not reach this year but we believe by the end of the first quarter next year, we would have attained,” Akufo-Addo said in an interview with Forbes Africa.

He added: “And the significance of it is that in a population of 30 million people, if we are able to vaccinate 20 million, it means we are vaccinating the entire adult population of Ghana and that in itself gives us all the immunity we need so as a target, it is a really important target. We are also taking some long-term decisions.”

At least 1,074 new coronavirus cases have been confirmed by the Ghana Health Service (GHS) pushing the country’s active cases to 9,534.

The death toll hits 1,287 after four additional fatalities were recorded across the country, an update on the GHS COVID-19 dashboard reveals.

So far, Ghana has confirmed a total of 141,295 COVID-19 cases since March 2020.

Fourth wave
Meanwhile, Dr Anthony Nsiah-Asare, the presidential advisor on health, has confirmed that Ghana is in a fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic as the country records over a 1000 cases daily.

Ghana currently has over 8,500 active cases and it is largely attributed to the new variant of the COVID-19, the Omicron which was discovered in South Africa early this month but has spread rapidly around the world.

Speaking on The Big Bulletin on Tuesday (28 December), Dr Nsiah-Asare said Ghana is also experiencing community spread of the new variant.

“We’re recording over a 1000 cases every day for the past few days. Now we’ve community spread, especially in Greater Accra and Ashanti Regions. We’re definitely in the fourth wave. So everybody has to be very careful. We need to wear our masks and avoid crowded areas,” he told Asaase News’ Beatrice Adu.