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Photo: AFP/JOEL SAGET

COVID-19 vaccine: Is South Africa prepared to immunise its population?

Despite having indicated its intention to join global health initiative Covax, SA has yet to outline how the vaccine will be distributed.

covid-19 vaccine covax

Photo: AFP/JOEL SAGET

Concerns are beginning to mount regarding how South Africa is planning to roll out soon-to-be available COVID-19 vaccines and immunise it’s population, which is currently the 14th worst affected by deaths relating to virus in the world. 

Despite hosting three separate trials by Johnson&Johnson and another two in partnership between AstraZeneca Plc and the University of Oxford, South Africa currently hasn’t committed to a distribution strategy that will comprehensively ensure that a vaccine is available to its 59 million citizens. 

South Africa need significant investment to move up the vaccine queue  

South Africa has signalled its intention to join up with global health initiative Covax, which aims to ensure that the world’s poorest people get access to the vaccine, and National Treasury has paid R500 million towards the programme. This payment, however, falls well short of the investment required to ensure that SA is moved to the front of the queue, so to to speak. 

Finance Minister Tito Mboweni has indicated that a further R4.5 billion will be needed to do that, and experts have warned that even then, only 3% of the population would be guaranteed an immunising jab.

Our neighbours to the north, Botswana and Namibia, have already agreed to procure vaccines from Covax for 20% of their populations of about 2 million people each, and Rwanda plans to raise $15 million for its first procurement of vaccines.

Aspen Pharmacare Holdings Ltd will be hoping to produce some one billion vaccines from a South African factory in 2021, with half of the these destined for emerging markets under the Covax program. South Africa will benefit from Johnson&Johnson’s production of the vaccine too, according to the South African Medical Research Council’s Glenda Grey. 

HJI reach out to government for clarity  

The Health Justice Initiative (HJI) has written to the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, Minister of Health Dr Zweli Mkhize and the head of the National Disaster Management Centre (NDMC), Dr Mmaphaka Tau, to better understand how the vaccines will be procured and rolled out. They said that the NDMC has a mandate to ensure that the distribution of the vaccine is well-coordinated. 

“The affordable, equitable and transparent access to vaccines within the context of COVID-19 falls squarely within this mandate,” they wrote. 

“Accordingly, the National Centre and all relevant institutional role-players responsible for managing this disaster are responsible for the development of disaster management plans and  strategies for the affordability and allocation of vaccines.”

They have asked for clarity on the following areas of concern: 

  • Have guidelines been developed to outline access to and allocation of vaccines?
  • Is there a plan to budget and prioritise vulnerable groups and key populations in relation to access to and allocation of vaccines?
  • Which specific institutions and national organs of state have been identified as the key institutional role-players involved in disaster management, which would be required to develop vaccine access and allocation plans as part of their disaster management plans and strategies?
  • What specific steps have been taken by the NDMC to assist with the coordination and implementation of these plans if/when they are developed?