The Young Nurses Indaba Trade Union (YNITU) says there is a lack of enthusiasm among healthcare workers ahead of the arrival of the Johnson and Johnson vaccines in the country.
The 80 000 doses of the vaccine will arrive this week and will be rolled out to vaccinate health care workers across the country.
Trials for the vaccine are continuing at 36 sites in South Africa, in Limpopo, the study into the efficacy and safety of the vaccine is being conducted at the Ndlovu Research Facility in Moutse.
YNITU’s Lerato Mthunzi says they feel the government does not have a clear-cut plan for the roll-out of the vaccine.
Mthunzi says, “The healthcare workers have lost trust in the government. The AstraZeneca is just but one of the incidents that show that our government does not plan appropriately for whatever role that they have and the decisions that they make are hasty and even just this convenient switch to Johnson and Johnson after discovering the AstraZeneca will be expiring in April is just but too convenient.”
Healthcare workers uncomfortable with being the first to receive vaccine:
Meanwhile, the Health Department says manufacturers of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine have submitted documentation to local regulator the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) for registration.
The department says in a statement that it’s continuously engaging with the manufacturers of the vaccine.
IN BRIEF: This is what is wrong with AstraZeneca:
J&J’s vaccine implementation study in SA gets regulator nod
The SAHPRA on Monday approved an implementation study of Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine but said they were still reviewing its full market application.
The implementation study will target inoculating between 350 000 to 500 000 health care workers, with the first batch of 80 000 doses expected to arrive this week.
SAHPRA said Johnson & Johnson has not yet submitted an application for emergency use authorisation of its vaccine, as Africa’s worst-hit country with coronavirus infections and deaths has yet to start its mass inoculation campaign.
The Chairperson of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on COVID-19 vaccines Professor Barry Schoub speaks about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine:
SONA Address
During his SONA, President Ramaphosa urged different stakeholders to play a part in the vaccination programme.
“The success of the vaccination programme will rely on active collaboration between all sectors of society. We are greatly encouraged by the active involvement of business, labour, the health industry and medical schemes in particular, in preparing for this mass vaccination drive.”
President Cyril Ramaphosa’s State-of-the-Nation-Address:
SA asks Serum Institute of India to take back one million vaccine doses:
South Africa has asked the Serum Institute of India to take back the one-million COVID-19 vaccine doses the company had sent earlier this month.
The decision comes after the government put on hold the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine doses in its vaccination programme.
AstraZeneca says its vaccine appears to offer limited protection against mild disease that the South African variant of the coronavirus causes.
This is based on data from a study by South Africa’s University of the Witwatersrand and Oxford University in the UK.
Another 500 000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were due to arrive in South Africa in the next few weeks.
The institute is not immediately available for comment.
