South Africa urges for 'patience' as it starts vaccinating its elderly against COVID-19

South Africa, on May 18, kick-started its ambitious COVID-19 vaccination drive for all people above the age of 60 years. With more than 1,615,485 cases and 55,260 deaths, the country has been battered by the coronavirus contagion. Just last week, the South African health ministry reported four cases of B.1.617.2 mutation of coronavirus which was first detected in India.

South Africa's COVID vaccination program has suffered major setbacks since it began earlier this year. The first blow came in February when the country slashed plans to use the AstraZeneca Plc.’s jabs over reports that it has reduced efficacy against the locally dominant virus. Later, it halted the use of vaccine developed by Johnson & Johnson in a research study vaccinating health workers because of concerns over very rare cases of blood clots. However, in a desperate move to end the supply bottleneck, the country recently inked pacts with Pfizer Inc. and J&J for a combined 61 million doses.

"We do know that our people have been waiting for long for these vaccines, ... but we are pleading for patience," the country’s Health Minister Zweli Mkhize told a news conference after receiving the first batch of Pfizer's shot on Monday. "We would have loved to have had the vaccines as early as January or December last year. It was not possible, but now it is here. Let's make use of it," he added.

Multiple variants detected

According to AP, Mkhize said that testing picked up 11 cases of the variants B.1.1.7 first detected in the UK and four cases of the B.1.617.2 variant, which was first found in India. In a statement, the minister said that the Network for Genomic Surveillance in South Africa (NGS-SA) confirmed that the “two variants of concern” have been detected in South Africa, in addition to the B.1.351 variant which was already dominating in the country. 

Mkhize informed, “The four cases of B.1.617.2 have been detected in Gauteng [2] and KwaZulu-Natal [2] and all have a history of a recent arrival from India. All cases have been isolated and managed according to the national COVID-19 case management guidelines and contact tracing has been performed in order to limit the spread of this variant”. 

Image: AP