Jesse Ramdeo

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly said she was heart­ened by the fast start to the roll­out of Pfiz­er vac­cines for stu­dents yes­ter­day.

De­spite yes­ter­day’s gloomy weath­er, it was a bright start to the Gov­ern­ment’s stu­dent vac­ci­na­tion pro­gramme, aimed at arm­ing the vul­ner­a­ble group with a lay­er of pro­tec­tion as the phys­i­cal re­open­ing of school inched clos­er.

Ac­cord­ing to Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly, the as­sem­bly of par­ents and stu­dents was a step in the right di­rec­tion in get­ting chil­dren back in­to class­rooms.

“The turnout is ex­cel­lent and I’m hear­ing of long lines at the he­li­port, so I’m hear­ing about a good turnout across the 14 sites.”

The min­is­ter ac­com­pa­nied her two chil­dren to the COSTAATT Port-of- Spain cam­pus yes­ter­day morn­ing to get them vac­ci­nat­ed.

Volunteers at the NAPA, Port-of-Spain vaccination site yesterday.

KERWIN PIERRE

How­ev­er, there are chil­dren yet to re­ceive the green light from their par­ents, a risk the min­is­ter said she was not will­ing to take.

“If my chil­dren get sick, I will not even be able to go in­to the hos­pi­tal with them and of­fer them that com­fort and be by their bed­side and the prospect of that drove me to say that is the bet­ter,” she said.

The Gov­ern­ment’s an­nounce­ment to vac­ci­nate stu­dents be­tween the ages of 12-18 last week, was met with some push­back from par­ents who chal­lenged the ef­fi­ca­cy and safe­ty of the vac­cine.

Head of the Con­cerned Par­ent Move­ment, Clarence Men­doza, had said his mem­ber­ship was scep­ti­cal about the in­for­ma­tion about the vac­cine.

But ac­cord­ing to Gads­by-Dol­ly, that hes­i­tan­cy will not de­bar stu­dents from re­turn­ing to the class­room, at least for now.

“There’s no call to show your vac­ci­na­tion sta­tus at this time. I don’t know who is vac­ci­nat­ed around me, it’s the sit­u­a­tion in the coun­try and like­ly the sit­u­a­tion in the schools.”

Long lines of motorists queue up at the Frankie Boodram International Race Track as the rollout of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines for children 12 years and older started yesterday.

ABRAHAM DIAZ

Over at the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts’ (NA­PA) vac­ci­na­tion site, or­gan­ised by the Amer­i­can Cham­ber of Com­merce of TT, US Charge d’ Af­fairs Shante Moore said he was en­cour­aged by the turnout.

“I was ini­tial­ly wor­ried that the rain would pre­vent peo­ple from com­ing out. That has not been the case. To see so many peo­ple wait­ing in the au­di­ence and so many wait­ing to get their vac­cines, that means a lot.

Mean­while, AM­CHAM pres­i­dent Car­o­line Toni-Sir­ju Ram­nar­ine said spe­cial ac­com­mo­da­tions were made at the fa­cil­i­ty to cater to the re­quire­ments of the younger vac­cine pop­u­la­tion.

Che and Christian Mendez pose for a picture after receiving their Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines at NAPA, Port-of-Spain, yesterday.

KERWIN PIERRE