Centre issues guidelines for booster doses, vaccination of children- details here

COVID-19 vaccination of children between 15-18 years will commence from January 3, 2022.

New Delhi: Union Health Ministry on Monday (December 27) issues fresh guidelines for COVID-19 vaccination of children between 15-18 years and precaution dose for health care and frontline workers, and 60+ age group with comorbidities.

The guidelines come days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday, during his address to the nation amid rising Omicron cases, announced COVID vaccination rollout for children aged 15-18 and precaution doses for health and frontline pandemic workers as well as senior citizens with co-morbidities.

For those HCWs&FLWs who have received two doses, another dose of COVID-19 vaccine would be provided from 10th Jan. The prioritization & sequencing of this precaution dose would be based on the completion of 9 months from the date of administration of 2nd dose reads the guidelines pic.twitter.com/0zffyTY9Jw

— ANI (@ANI) December 27, 2021

Here’s all you need to know about the health ministry’s guidelines.

• COVID vaccination for children aged between 15-18 will commence from January 3, 2022.
• Children will be given only Covaxin doses, India’s first indigenous coronavirus vaccine.
• The 15-18 age group beneficiaries can get themselves self-registered for vaccination on the Cowin app.
• Health care workers and front-line workers who have already received two doses of vaccine will start getting the third dose from January 10, 2022.
• The prioritization and sequencing of the precaution dose would be based on the completion of 9 months from the date of administration of the second dose of the COVID vaccine.
• A person aged 60 and above can get the precautionary dose of the COVID-19 vaccine only if they have some comorbidities and will have to present a medical certificate for the same.
• Beneficiaries can register for the precaution dose via their existing Cowin app.
• Eligibility of such beneficiaries for the precaution dose will be based on the date of administration of the second dose as recorded in the Co-WIN system.
• Registration and appointment services can be accessed through both, the online and the onsite modes for all the beneficiaries.
• The details of the administration of the precaution dose will be reflected in the vaccination certificates.