The government has lowered the age limit of general people for receiving booster dose of coronavirus vaccine to 40 years from 50 years in a bid to ensure special protection for people amid the ongoing fresh wave of the virus transmission in the country.

Health Minister Zahid Maleque came up with the announcement at a press conference at the Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons in Dhaka on Sunday.

"From now on, people aged 40 and above will be able to get a booster dose of Covid-19 vaccine”, he said.So far, 9.70 crore people have received the first dose and of them, six crore have received second dose.

Mentioning that the Covid-19 situation is becoming grimmer in the country due to the violation of health safety guidelines, the minister said the real number of infections is multiple times higher than detected and if this continues, the daily death toll will rise to 60 or more.

On December 19 last year, Bangladesh administered the booster doses of the vaccine as trial case, as part of its measures to fight the pandemic in the wake of the worldwide spread of Omicron.

Later on December 28, the country officially began administering booster doses with Pfizer vaccine.

However, the DGHS in a statement on January 13 asked the authorities concerned to use Moderna vaccine as the third or booster dose instead of Pfizer vaccine at all vaccine centres across Bangladesh.