WHO takes a U-turn on Covid-19 booster shot, backs it after ‘moratorium’ call
WHO) has said that it strongly supported "urgent and broad access" to booster doses of COVID-19 vaccines, capping a reversal of the UN agency's repeated insistence last year that boosters weren't necessary for healthy people and contributed to vaccine inequity.
According to a statement released by the WHO expert group, immunisation with authorized COVID-19 vaccines provide high levels of protection against severe disease and death amid the continuing spread of the hugely contagious Omicron variant, news agency AP reported.
Last year, WHO's director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called for a moratorium on booster doses. The Director-General of WHO has called for a moratorium on booster vaccination for healthy adults until the end of 2021 to counter the persisting and profound inequity in global vaccine access (2).
While many countries are far from reaching the 40% coverage target by the end of 2021, other countries have vaccinated well beyond this threshold, already reaching children and implementing extensive booster vaccination programmes.
United States
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Cases: 46 252 513
Deaths: 750 423
Recovered: 0
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India
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Cases: 34 321 025
Deaths: 459 652
Recovered: 0
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Brazil
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Cases: 21 835 785
Deaths: 608 235
Recovered: 0
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United Kingdom
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Cases: 9 215 683
Deaths: 141 607
Recovered: 0
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Russia
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Cases: 8 494 589
Deaths: 237 619
Recovered: 0
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