8 of the 671 people who died from COVID-19 were fully vaccinated and obesity played a big role

8 of the 671 people who died from COVID-19 in Fiji were fully vaccinated.

Permanent Secretary for Health, Doctor James Fong says this comes to 1.2% of the total deaths.

He says they continue to monitor the success rate of vaccination as assessments show hospitalisations, severe cases and deaths from COVID-19 have dropped as vaccination rates went up.

Doctor Fong also says it is also important for people to work on getting fit as obesity played a big role in the 8 fully vaccinated people that have died.

He says we have to be mindful of this as the third wave will be from breakthrough infections meaning people getting COVID-19 even after they have been vaccinated.

Doctor Fong also says it would be the height of stupidity for the Health Ministry to reduce the COVID-19 testing just to match the narrative of opening the borders. He says they worked off the number of hospitalisations, deaths and the fact that we have good vaccination coverage.

The Permanent Secretary says it also makes sense that they can’t hold the whole country down because a small group of people do not wish to get vaccinated.