The ongoing vaccination of the Johnson & Johnson vaccines, which started this week in the Greater Accra Region, was expected to end today.

But, the Ghana Health Service (GHS) says it is not ending the exercise until the allocated doses are exhausted.

Speaking to JoyNews on Friday, the Director of Public Health at GHS, Dr Franklin Asiedu Bekoe, said although the initial plan was to exhaust the vaccines in five days, they still have some vaccines which must be administered.

“The idea was that let’s get a campaign mood to exhaust it in five days, but that does not mean that the exercise is ending.

“Our plan is to use all the vaccines, so we are not rigid about when it is ending; so far as we have some vaccines left, we will continue,” he assured.

He noted that there is a possibility that the Ashanti Region have used all their vaccines but indicated that the Greater Accra Region still have about 20% to be administered hopefully by the close of Monday.

“This Johnson & Johnson will expire in 2023, so there’s no pressure on it to get people vaccinated, so when people come, we will vaccinate them,” he added.

Meanwhile, while responding to some concerns about the vaccine shortages in some districts, he said the arrival of the AstraZeneca will soon be deployed.

However, the focus will be for persons who took the first jab in March only, hence advised those who were administered to stay off the J&J vaccination exercise.

He is, therefore, confident that by the time they will finish administering the J&J vaccines, the jabs for the AstraZeneca will be ready for the second dose vaccination.