ISLAMABAD: The National Command and Operation Centre announced on Friday that citizens over 18 years old will be eligible for a free anti-Covid booster dose of their choice from tomorrow onwards.
“Age limit for a booster dose has been further reduced. Booster (one dose) will be administered after 6 months gap from complete vaccination.
A day earlier, Pakistan reported seven Covid-19 related deaths and 3,567 new positive cases.
According to the NCOC’s statistics, 48,449 tests were conducted and the positivity ratio reached 7.36 percent.
Covid first emerged in the country in February 2020 and hit its peak in the summer. The cases started declining in July only to rise again towards the end of the year in the form of its second wave.
Two more Covid waves were witnessed in the first quarter and then in the second quarter of last year. The waves were driven by deadlier delta and the Indian variant of coronavirus. Now, the country is in the grip of a fifth wave fuelled by a superspreader variant, Omicron.
On January 11, Planning Minister Asad Umar, who supervises the government’s anti-Covid strategy, reiterated his call on all the provinces to follow the non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) and the obligatory regime in letter and spirits in order to curtail the spread of the fifth wave of Covid-19.
Umar, the head of the NCOC, told the ceremony that the people who had not been vaccinated so far must get the shots as soon as possible, while those fully vaccinated six months ago, should go for a booster doze.
