Mpumalanga to receive Covid-19 vaccine tomorrow

The first batch of the Covid-19 vaccine has arrived in Mpumalanga and will be launched on Friday. The premier, Refilwe Mtshweni-Tsipane, and the MEC for the Department of Health (DoH), Sasekani Manzini, will officially launch it at Rob Ferreira Hospital.

Dumisani Malamule, the spokesperson for DoH, had previously told Lowvelder that the vaccines allocated to the province will not be immediately available for everyone to access.

“A prioritisation system will have to be applied as guided by the National Health Council. The programme will be rolled out in three phases, starting with the most vulnerable in our province’s population,” he explained.

Malamule said the vaccines will be transported from national and delivered straight to the provincial medical depot. “Distribution from the provincial medical depot to the respective 33 hospitals in the province will follow based on their target set. The hospitals will serve as the distribution and storage hubs for their catchment vaccination sites including PHC facilities,” he said.

The first one will be frontline healthcare workers. Phase two will include 2 500 000 essential workers, as well as 1 100 000 persons in congregated settings, 5 000 000 people 60 years and older, and 8 000 000 people older than 18 years with comorbidities.

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It is divided into three platforms: work-based vaccinations, outreach-based vaccinations and vaccination centres. Essential workers are listed as police officers, miners and workers in security, retail, food production, funeral, teachers, banking, essential municipal and home affairs, border control and port health services.

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People with comorbidities are persons living with uncontrolled diabetes, chronic lung diseases, poorly controlled cardiovascular diseases, renal diseases, HIV, tuberculosis and obesity. Congregated settings include care homes, detention centres, shelters and prisons. Phase three will consist of 22 500 000 other people 18 years and older.