WATCH: Malta’s General Public To Start Being Inoculated Sooner As Fourth, Single-Dose Vaccine Set To Arrive Next Month
Malta’s drive to inoculate as many people as soon as possible has just received another welcomed push thanks to a new vaccine arriving in a matter of weeks, Health Minister Chris Fearne confirmed last night.
“In March, we’re going to have the fourth vaccine, that of Johnson & Johnson,” Fearne announced last night on XTRA. “We have around 250,000 doses of that vaccine which we can add to the rest.”
The advantage to the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, as Fearne explained, is that you only need one dose to be considered protected from COVID-19.
“This means that, thanks to this vaccine and all the others, we’ll be in a much better position come April,” Fearne said.
When asked about what that means for the general public, Fearne had some hopeful projections to offer.
“The initial plan was to open vaccinations to the general public towards the end of May,” he said. “But since we’re already two weeks in advance and are getting the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in March, we can approach even further.”
“This means we might not open up to the general public towards the end of May, but maybe even closer to the beginning of May,” Fearne finished.
As Malta continues to storm ahead in its vaccination drive, over 13,000 people have now been fully inoculated against COVID-19.
With Public Health Superintendent Charmaine Gauci set to shortly provide the latest related details in her daily press briefing, Malta had managed to administer 44,598 doses by Wednesday evening. Of those total vaccinations, 12,928 were second doses.
Earlier this week, Fearne couldn’t help himself from using this figure to throw a jab at Labour’s crushing win in the last General Election.
Meanwhile, new infections have persisted in the triple digits, with Malta’s active cases remaining over 2,000 for the last 35 days.
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