Dentists, pharmacists and other medical personnel can continue administering covid-19 vaccines when the state of emergency is lifted on Wednesday.

THE Miscellaneous Provisions (2019 Novel Coronavirus  (2019-nCoV) Vaccination Personnel) Bill, 2021 was laid, debated and passed in the House of Representatives on Friday.

The bill, laid by Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi allowed them to administer covid19 vaccines in accordance with emergency powers under the state of emergency. The attorney general said if amendments to the acts were not made, it would leave the vaccination drive short-staffed after the SoE ends as the government has been utilizing the services of these practitioners since June.

PSA media spoke with President of the Pharmacy Board of Trinidad and Tobago Andrew Rahaman on Tuesday who welcomed the move. He said the ministry of health has been providing training for these groups on administering vaccines. 

Mr. Rahaman explained, “The ministry of health had put on about 2 or 3 cohorts of training to supplement our knowledge of administering vaccines and so we were covered in law by the emergency powers act and now the SOE is about to expire we needed to be covered by another way so they simply passed another law. So it’s not that anything is changing, we were already significantly involved in administering of the vaccine.”

PSA media then asked about the effects of medical practitioners to which Mr. Rahaman said there are only positives. “That we are out there assisting with the whole response to covid and also that we are finding out a rightful place within the healthcare team,” he expressed.

The bill would affect the emergency ambulance services and emergency medical personnel act chapter 26:02; the pharmacy board act 29:52; the nursing personnel act 29:53; the dental profession act 25:54; the veterinary surgeon registration act 67:04; and the professions related to medicine act, chapter 90:04.