Tanzania’s government says it will delay the purchase of the COVID-19 vaccine until it is satisfied that there are no side effects.
This comes at a time when the World Health Organisation is reporting a surge in COVID-19 cases and deaths in Africa as new, more contagious variants of the virus spread to additional countries.
SABC News Tanzania correspondent Daniel Kijo has the latest:
Last week, Tanzanian President John Magufuli said that the country did not need a coronavirus lockdown because God would protect his people and homespun precautions such as steam inhalation were better than dangerous foreign vaccines.
Contradicting global scientific consensus and advice from the World Health Organization (WHO), Magufuli’s government has largely eschewed mask-wearing and social distancing in Tanzania.
It stopped reporting coronavirus data in mid-2020.
“Vaccines are not good. If they were, then the white man would have brought vaccines for HIV/AIDS,” Magufuli said during the opening of a new farm in his western home region.
“We Tanzanians haven’t locked ourselves in and we don’t expect to lock ourselves down. I don’t expect to announce any lockdown because our God is living and He will continue to protect Tanzanians, ” he added. – additional reporting by Reuters.
