Coronavirus: BioNTech booster shots to be made available to all Hong Kong residents from January, Carrie Lam reveals
- Third doses of the German-made vaccine have only been offered to those in high-risk categories or residents with two jabs of the mainland-produced Sinovac drug
- How long people must wait between a second and third dose of vaccine likely to be determined later this month
To date, a third dose of the drug has only been offered to those in high-risk groups, such as the elderly and those with chronic diseases, or residents who have taken two jabs of the less-effective Sinovac vaccine.
“I already gave instructions to the Food and Health Bureau yesterday that we need to enter the phase of injecting our residents with the third shot, including that of BioNTech,” Lam said at her final press briefing of the year.
“That means the third BioNTech shot will no longer be restricted to people from high-risk groups so long as there is a sufficient time lapse [between the second and third doses].
“We hope that by the start of January, we will be able to expand the vaccination programme for BioNTech.”
Further details would be released after a government meeting later this month with experts from its committee on vaccine preventable diseases as well as another specialising in emerging and zoonotic diseases, Lam said.
About 260,000 Hongkongers have received a booster shot so far, with just over 70 per cent of the city’s population having taken at least one jab.
