Skopje, 22 November 2021 (MIA) – Steps will be made in the coming period to raise public awareness about the importance of immunization after interest into vaccination has been dropping in recent weeks, says Faculty of Pharmacy professor Aleksandra Grozdanova. Speaking at Monday’s online conversation on the immunization process in the country, Grozdanova noted that nearly 48% of the adult population in North Macedonia has received COVID-19 vaccines. “Figures revealed in the neighborhood and beyond during the autumn wave are far from being good. As serious surge is expected, our intention is to increase the vaccination rate,” said Grozdanova, who is also the national immunization coordinator. Commenting on the recent proposed measures aimed to stop the spread of COVID-19, according to which public sector employees will be required Covid status certificate to enter public facilities, she said similar measures have been introduced in many other countries. “I hope they will be received well. Perhaps, better informative campaign is needed, more transparency and more discussions in order to identify why people don’t want to be vaccinated,” the professor said. Worldwide, 7.7 billion doses of Covid vaccines have been administered and 53% of the world’s population is jabbed. Speaking about Covid vaccine disinformation, Grozdanova said it is doing harm by the disinformation also being spread amongst medical workers. “It’s a painful subject for me being a medical professional. If medical workers are against vaccination, if they don’t believe in science and medicine, they shouldn’t be in healthcare at all,” the professor stressed, adding that all health workers should be inoculated without discussions. About 75% of health workers in the country have been vaccinated. Furthermore, the national immunization coordinator said that all vaccines are safe, but the ones produced in China have proven less effective against the Delta variant than mRNA vaccines, which is why a booster dose of the Pfizer vaccines has been recommended.