Staff Reporter
South Africa will receive about 80 000 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine next week as part of the nine million doses set to be delivered to the country during the course of the year.
This was announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa when he delivered his State of the Nation Address on Thursday.
“We have secured nine million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine,” he said.
“The first batch of 80 000 doses will arrive in the country next week. Further consignments will arrive over the next four weeks, totalling 500 000 Johnson & Johnson vaccines.”
Ramaphosa said the country has also secured 12 million vaccine doses from the global COVAX facility.
This, he said, will be complemented by other vaccines that are available to South Africa through the AU’s African Vaccine Acquisition Task Team facility.
Pfizer has committed 20 million vaccine doses commencing with deliveries at the end of the first quarter.
The latest vaccine procurements come after the country learnt this week that the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine brought from the Serum Institute of India offers minimal protection from mild to moderate infection by the new variant known as 501Y.v2.
“Since this variant is now the dominant variant in our country, these findings have significant implications for the pace, design and sequencing of our vaccine programme,” said the president.
The consignment is expected to kickstart the first phase of the vaccination programme targeted at health and other frontline workers.
The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is said to be more effective against the 501Y.V2 variant.
Ramaphosa said the government was continuing engagements with other vaccine manufacturers to ensure the country secures sufficient quantities of vaccines that are suitable for local conditions.
“The health and safety of our people remains our paramount concern,” he said.
“All medication imported into the country is monitored, evaluated, investigated, inspected and registered by the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority.”