Health Minister Zweli Mkhize has confirmed that government will resume the use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in its Sisonke trial on Wednesday.
Government had paused the use of the vaccine after cases of rare blood clots were reported in six recipients in the US.
However, the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (Sahpra) found no evidence of blood clots in this country.
It then recommended that government resume the use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
Two weeks ago, Mkhize briefed South Africans on the Johnson and Johnson vaccine:
Mkhize says there is also a general agreement among countries that the use of the vaccine should resume.
“What has now come out from our review of reports and documentation on what is happening all over the world has made us to therefore come to an agreement that we should actually reopen the vaccination. Yes, there is an association that has been established between the problem of clots and the vaccine but there is a feeling that the incident is very, very low. So we will be resuming the whole programme,” says the minister.
The video below is Minister Mkhize’s interview on Morning Live:
