All NL residents over 60 can get a booster shot before year's end: GGD

All people over the age of 60 who want a booster shot against Covid-19 will be able to get one before the turn of the year, the GGD promised. The GGDs will administer 350,000 booster doses of the Covid-19 vaccines this week. Next week, they'll scale up to 700,000 shots. "Overall, we are on track to have 3 million shots by the end of the year," the GGD said to newspaper AD.

After New Year's, people under 60 will get their turn for a booster shot. In most cases, this third shot will be given in the seventh month after the second vaccination. The booster shots will also be necessary for travel purposes. The EU health ministers decided that coronavirus access passes would expire without a booster shot, starting February 1 next year. 

So far, some 700 thousand people in the Netherlands have had a booster shot or about 5 percent of adults. These are older people, people working in care and healthcare, and people with a severe immune disorder.

Ernst Kuipers of acute care network LNAZ recently criticized the slow start of the booster shot campaign in the Netherlands. On Wednesday, he argued for simplifying the logistics around the campaign and scrapping the condition that people can only get a booster shot six months or longer after their last Covid-19 vaccination.

Health Minister Hugo de Jonge considers that proposal unwise, a spokesperson said to AD. The third jab offers better protection if it does not come shortly after the second vaccination. That is also according to the Health Council recommendation, the spokesperson said.