The government of Morocco has expanded its COVID-19 vaccination campaign to children from Tuesday with 12 to 17-year-olds now eligible to receive their shots.
According to the World Health Organization, The North African country has administrated about 33 million doses to adults and is now focusing its efforts on inoculating teenagers to ensure a safe return to schools.
Fattouma Chouilakh, the mother of 12-year-old Aya Achouri, who received the Pfizer vaccine at Amr Alim Middle School in Rabat where she studies approved the government decision, She said, “I chose to vaccinate my daughter because we want our children to be able to go to school,” said
“We suffered a lot of problems with distanced education, there were no positive results,” Chouilakh added.
A total of 420 vaccination centres, including some schools, have opened across Morocco to vaccinate minors from August 31 to October 3.
The vaccine is not mandatory and parents are the ones deciding if their children will receive the shots.
According to the head of the Amr Alim Middle School, Ryad Solh, those who do not want to vaccinate their children will not be allowed to send them to school and must instead follow a distanced education program,
Health Authorities said the campaign, which will use the Pfizer and Sinopharm vaccines, is expected to reach about 3 million Moroccan students.
The North African country has registered more than 856,000 coronavirus cases and 12,540 deaths linked to COVID-19.