Home

Health Ministry celebrates ‘early’ first vaccination milestone

Reading Time: 2 minutes

The National Health Department says South Africa is rapidly and successfully rolling out the delivery of the early access Johnson and Johnson vaccine to healthcare workers through the Sisonke Programme.

“And within just over one week, from a standing start, 63 648 patient-facing healthcare workers in the public and private sector have been vaccinated against COVID-19,” it adds.

The Department of Health says the Sisonke Programme is outperforming original targets for a number of vaccines delivered in its first week and is set to continue this momentum in its second week as more sites come online.

The Health authorities say the rapid rollout of the vaccine is a critical first step in the three-phase national vaccination rollout plan.

In just under one week, the Health Ministry says, the Sisonke Programme has set up 18 vaccination sites from scratch and ensured the safe and timely vaccination of tens of thousands of healthcare workers. It is urging healthcare workers to be patient as it continues to scale up the rollout.

Below is an explainer on the three-phase vaccination rollout plan:

Earlier today, the second batch of 80 000 doses of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine arrived in the country, taking the number of the total doses the country has received so far to 160 000.

In the video below is the arrival of the J&J’s second batch:

Single-dose J&J vaccine

On Tuesday, Johnson and Johnson filed an updated set of trial results with the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for review, taking into account additional follow-up time for people enrolled in the trials.

The Health Ministry says that South Africa welcomes the news that the single-dose J& J vaccine is even more efficacious than previously expected with a 64% efficacy rate at preventing the more contagious 501Y.V2 variant.

“We further welcome the news that the expert panel at the FDA unanimously recommended the vaccine for approval last night. FDA approval of the single-dose JnJ vaccine for general use is expected this weekend, paving the wave for similar approval by SAHPRA in a few weeks. Until then, the early access JnJ vaccine will continue to be provided through the Sisonke partnership between government and the South African MRC,” the Ministry says.

Below is the Department’s full statement:

Author

MOST READ