AMMAN —
Vaccination against the COVID-19 virus “will not be
mandatory,” Health Ministry Secretary General for epidemics and communicable
diseases Adel Balbisi said on Thursday.
اضافة اعلان
In an interview on Al-Mamlaka, the health official that “no
one, not even physicians, will be forced to take the vaccine,” noting that
healthcare workers and teachers are on top of the priority list for
inoculation.
He noted however, that the Ministry of Education is
selecting some 6,000 teachers and test monitors to evaluate and supervise the
General Secondary Education Certificate Examination (Tawjihi), who would have
to be vaccinated.
“All teachers will turnout for vaccinations because they do
not know whom the government will select …. The ministry will also go to
schools and administer shots there,” Balbisi said.
On Wednesday,
The National Center for Security and Crisis Management issued a list of proposed measures to stimulate public and private
sector workers to register for the COVID-19 vaccine.
Should they go into effect, the new measures would ban those
who have not received the vaccine from entering public facilities, shopping
malls and most service sector institutions, whereas those who have been
immunized would have access to all public facilities, parks movie theatres
and sports matches.
The measures would also require both public and private
sector employees to test for coronavirus every Saturday, at their own expense,
as of June 1.
Private sector institutions that have not vaccinated their
employees, with “at least” the first
COVID jab, would have to close their
doors, starting August 1, while those that have vaccinated less than 80 percent
of their employees would be restricted to operating with 50 percent of their
staff, as of June 1.
Balbisi expected that the number of vaccinated people will
reach 3 million at least by July 1, noting that May alone will see the
inoculation of some 1 million people.
The health official added that once Jordan reaches 4 million
vaccinated people, there will be no fear of a next wave, noting however that
other strains of the virus “can change the entire scene.”
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