COVID vaccine booster shots for elderly homes brought forward after two infection clusters

Health Minister Chris Fearne says two clusters of infections in elderly homes have prompted the authorities to bring forward the COVID vaccine booster programme by a week

Residents in elderly homes will receive a third COVID-19 vaccine shot from next week to boost their immunity
Residents in elderly homes will receive a third COVID-19 vaccine shot from next week to boost their immunity

Vaccine booster shots for residents in elderly homes will start being administered from Monday 6 September after two clusters of COVID-19 infections were recorded recently.

Health Minister Chris Fearne said the vaccine booster shots programme was brought forward by a week in the wake of the latest developments.

Fearne said a cluster of nine elderly people who contracted COVID-19 was recorded in one home and another cluster of five people was registered in a different home. All elderly patients were vaccinated.

“Although the symptoms in people who are vaccinated are generally mild, elderly people most often suffer from other conditions and so we have decided to bring forward the third vaccine jab by a week in view of the clusters that have developed,” Fearne said on Thursday.

He added that next week, vulnerable people who are immuno-suppressed will start receiving an invite to get their COVID-19 vaccine booster shot and elderly in the community aged 70 and over will start receiving their third jab in the first week of October.

Fearne said that the booster shots will be either Pfizer or Moderna, even for those who originally took the AstraZeneca. As regards those who took the Johnsson vaccine, studies are still being done to determine whether it would be best to give these people a second Johnsson vaccine jab before proceeding to a booster.

He said any decision on whether to roll out booster shots to the rest of the population will be taken in due course.

Fearne urged people to remain vigilant since the Delta variant, first identified in India, was causing widespread problems in some countries.

However, given the high vaccination rate in Malta, Fearne said more restrictions will be lifted to allow stand-up events to take place.