PHNOM PENH– Cambodian Prime Minister, Samdech Techo Hun Sen, today urged high-risk groups in the capital, Phnom Penh, to receive the fourth dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, starting from Jan 14.
The fourth-dose campaign will begin with frontliners, including leaders of the government, the senate, the National Assembly, frontline doctors, government officials, the army and police, local authorities and the elderly, according to the health ministry.
Staff of embassies and both national and international organisations, as well as, journalists and celebrities are also invited to join the campaign, the ministry added.
The kingdom reported three more local cases of the Omicron COVID-19 variant, bringing the total number of the variant to 183, Hun Sen said, during the inauguration of a stretch of National Road 5, in north-western Battambang province, and his speech was broadcast live on the state-run National Television of Cambodia (TVK).
“The Omicron has now spread in our community. On Saturday, the first case was confirmed and yesterday, three more cases were detected,” he said.
Meanwhile, Hun Sen announced the start of the new academic year 2022, for general education, saying that, more than three million students would return to school for the new academic year, beginning from today.
Cambodia reopened all socio-economic activities since Nov, buoyed by its high vaccination rates.
The country had so far administered at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccines to 14.28 million people, or 89.2 percent of its 16-million population, the health ministry said.
Of them, 13.68 million, or 85.5 percent, were fully vaccinated with two required shots, and 3.91 million, or 24.4 percent, had taken a booster shot, it added.
Most of the vaccines used in the country’s inoculation campaign are China’s Sinovac and Sinopharm.
Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK