Vooma vaccination drive to take place next weekend as citizens urged to get second jab

Government is set to roll out another vaccination drive themed Vooma Vaccination Weekend to encourage citizens to get their vaccinations against Covid-19.

This was annonuced by Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele during a post-Cabinet briefing on Thursday morning.

Gungubele said the nationwide mass vaccination drive would take place next weekend from 12 to 14 November.

“The upcoming Vooma Vaccination weekend is an opportunity for unvaccinated people to join our nation’s fight against Covid-19 by taking the free vaccines at any of the vaccination sites across the country.

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Vaccination is free to everyone living in South Africa and available at government health facilities or private pharmacies that offer vaccinations, with or without a medical aid.

The minister reiterated that vaccination was South Africa’s best defence against a possible fourth wave of Covid-19 infection.

In the previous vaccination drive, government aimed to vaccinate 500,000 people. However, a total of 353,819 people came out to receive their vaccines.

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SA’s vaccine rollout

Gungubele further said that three out of every five people aged over 50 years were now vaccinated.

“We need to get to five out of five of such vaccinated age group by the end of the year to kill the power of the anticipated fourth wave,” he said.

As of Wednesday, over 22 million vaccines had been administered in South Africa. However, only half of those jabbed were fully vaccinated.

It has been reported that more than 14 million people had not returned for their second dose of the Pfizer vaccine.

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“Cabinet reminded people to ensure that they take a second dose of the Pfizer vaccine to be fully protected. Vaccines help prevent serious illness, hospitalisation or death from Covid-19,” the minister added.

President Cyril Ramaphosa previously said government wanted to vaccinate 70% of the adult population in South Africa by the end of 2021 ,as a fourth wave of Covid-19 is expected to hit the country.

Covid stats

As of Wednesday, South Africa has recorded a total of 2,922,735 positive cases of Covid-19, with 344 new cases identified since the last report.

The majority of new cases currently are from Gauteng (41%), followed by Western Cape (13%) and KwaZulu-Natal (12%).

Free State accounted for 10%; North West accounted for 8%; Eastern Cape accounted for 6%; Mpumalanga accounted for 5%; Northern Cape accounted for 3%; and Limpopo accounted for 1% of the new cases.

This increase represents a 1.3% positivity rate, said the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) on Wednesday.

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