Persons who have recently fully recovered from the COVID-19 virus do not have to wait a month or even three months before getting vaccinated.
This is according to National Epidemiologist Harmony Brewley-Massiah who made the statement during a recent COVID-19 panel discussion.
She advised residents who have fully recovered from the COVID-19 virus, to seek vaccination as soon as possible, to further protect themselves from being reinfected with the virus.
“Recovering from COVID-19 is not a limitation for you getting the vaccine. If you don’t have any symptoms and you’ve recovered, you can go and get the vaccine. You do not have to wait three months. Three months is only if you got monoclonal antibody therapy and nor do you have to wait one month,” she stated.
“The one-month time frame was given cause you know after you’ve had an infection, you would have that immune effect, so they were saying after one month when the immunity starts to wake then you get that vaccine and it acts as a booster. But you don’t need to wait one month, you can go and get it and have that antibody immune effect, layered upon the natural immunity that you got from the infection,” she explained.
COVID increasing among youth
Brewley-Massiah also said that there was a growing concern among medical professionals with the development of how the COVID-19 virus has been impacting young people.
She said this is a trend that has not only been spotted internationally and in the region, but also here in the BVI.
“The public needs to be concerned that there’s a phenomenon that is being seen around the globe whereby there is a shift now where COVID is actually now affecting the younger populations. Because a lot of the older populations, those have been vaccinated so obviously it’s going to adapt, it’s going to evolve and it’s going to start to impact the younger population and that is exactly what we’re seeing here and we have a very large percentage of unvaccinated young people here in the territory,” she stated.
The national epidemiologist therefore urged more young persons to come forward and seek vaccination as the territory aim to reach its goal of having between 70 to 80 percent of its population vaccinated to reach herd immunity.
The latest vaccination summary dated August 23 stated that a total of 17,095 persons were fully and partially vaccinated.
Of that sum, 12,733 were fully vaccinated.