Covid vaccination of schoolchildren begins Thursday

After trial inoculation of schoolchildren, the two city corporations of Dhaka will start the first round of Covid vaccination of children aged between 5 and 11 years in a wider range from today (Thursday) for 12 days until 7 September.

The second round will start after two months of the first dose.

A total of 18,000 children of 21 schools – 15 schools under Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) and six schools of Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) – will get Pfizer vaccine during this period. There are 13,972 children aged 5-11 years in 15 DNCC schools and 4,035 children in six DSCC schools.     

The vaccination camp will start at 9am on Thursday.

The children will receive the second dose eight weeks after receiving the first dose. All of them will have to be registered on the Surokkha app with their birth certificate.

So far, a total of 18,000 students of DNCC and 25,000 students of DSCC have registered.

Meanwhile, in a programme on Wednesday, Health Minister Zahid Maleque said, "I will advise the parents to register first before coming to receive the vaccine. We have sufficient jabs," he said. 

Primarily, children's vaccination activities will be conducted in 12 city corporations of the country. Later, the vaccination will be conducted for the children at districts, upazilas, municipalities and community levels, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).   

On 11 August, 16 children were given Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine doses on a trial basis. They are all students of Abul Bashar Government Primary School. Nidhi Nandini, a class three student of the school, was the first one to get Covid-19 vaccine under the trial run.