December 14, 2022

T&T Receives First Tranche Of M-Pox Vaccines

By Newsroom

Trinidad and Tobago has received 1,400 doses of the WHO approved monkey-pox vaccines, now officially called m-pox.

A statement from the Ministry of Health this morning said this is the first of two shipments via the Pan American Health Organization platform.

The second tranche of vaccines is scheduled to arrive in the near future.

The Ministry of Health will adopt the WHO interim guidelines  as it relates to use of these vaccines. The National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (NITAG), upon review of these interim guidelines, has recommended that these vaccines will be administered:

-to individuals who are close contacts of confirmed positive cases only;

-to individuals within the above category who are eighteen (18) years and older, but NOT pregnant and/or breastfeeding; and

-as a post exposure preventative vaccination (PEPV) programme.

As such, only individuals who meet the above criteria would be eligible and a mass vaccination campaign would not be utilised at this time.

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