DDGHS urges pregnant women to get booster shot

By Rathindra Kuruwita

Pregnant women should get the booster shot without any fear, Deputy Director General of Health Services, Dr. Hemantha Herath said yesterday.

Dr. Herath said that during the third wave of the pandemic, 60 unvaccinated pregnant women and 89 children had died of Covid-19.

“It is important for everyone to get the third dose of vaccine.” he said, noting that the Omicron variant was spreading rapidly across the world, and it was inevitable that it would spread in Sri Lanka too. The Deputy Director General of Health Services said that health officials were putting in place systems that could tackle a possible increase in case loads due to the new coronavirus variant.

“We must also try to reduce disease severity and prevent deaths. For this purpose, getting a booster shot is vital. Research has shown us that a booster increases immunity, and when your immunity is strong you have less severe symptoms and it also reduces the chance of you infecting someone else,” Dr. Herath said.

So far over 1.4 million Sri Lankans have taken the booster (third jab) and the ministry hoped to administer the booster on the majority of Sri Lankans in the next few weeks, he said.