The provincial Department of Health (DoH) said a consignment of vaccines will be transported from the national medical depot to the provincial one.
The spokesperson for DoH, Dumisani Malamule, said the department has developed a vaccination roll-out plan as per guidelines provided by the national DoH. He said the department was pleased by the arrival of the first consignment of Covid-19 vaccines in the country on Monday; however, he did not specify on which date it will be transported to Mpumalanga.
“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 National Health Council. The programme will be rolled out in three phases starting with the most vulnerable in our province’s population.”According to Malamule, the vaccines will be given to both public and private sectors. “This is because both sectors are treated as one health sector and will be treated the same. Further distribution from the provincial medical depot to the 33 respective 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 explained.
Malamule added that the vaccine has been found to be one of the interventions to rapidly counteract Covid-19 transmission. “The aim is to achieve herd immunity among the communities.”
According to a statement released by the national DoH on January 21, the vaccine will be given out in three phases. The first one will be frontline healthcare workers. The targeted population is 1 250 000. In phase two, 2 500 000 essential workers are next, 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, outreachbased 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 co-morbidities 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 consists of 22 500 000 other people 18 years and older.
