Singapore is opening up its Covid-19 vaccination programme to adolescents from Tuesday to help contain the latest outbreak that has infected some students, and will step up testing and tracing.
The city-state is among the first countries in the world to offer vaccines to teenagers before completing inoculation of adults.
The city-state will open up vaccination for 12-18 year-old adolescents, followed by the last group of young adults aged 39 years and below.
“As long as our population is mostly vaccinated, we should be able to trace, isolate, and treat the cases that pop up, and prevent a severe and disastrous outbreak,” Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said on Monday in a speech.
The prime minister said everyone who is eligible for a vaccination and wants one should be able to get at least their first jab by the country’s national day, which falls on August 9.
Over a third of Singapore’s population of 5.7 million has received at least the first dose so far.
The country should also be…