Health workers in Gauteng reassured to receive Covid-19 vaccination, as more than 10 000 ‘protected’

Health department spokesperson Popo Maja said that South Africa was rapidly moving to protect its highly valued healthcare workers through the Sisonke early access program.

The World Health Organisation had reported that healthcare workers were an especially vulnerable group.

“A threat to their safety and well-being has a further impact on the health systems capacity to deal with people with Covid-19 during the pandemic,” Maja said.

“The J & J vaccine used in the Sisonke program provides 57% protection against moderate-severe disease, 85% protection against severe disease and 100% protection against death, based on evidence from the clinical trials that included South African participants.”

He said by the end of Saturday, more than 10 000 healthcare workers had already been successfully vaccinated.

“One third of the first 80 000 vaccines will be allocated to the private sector over the next 14 days.

“All healthcare workers irrespective of where they work need to be vaccinated. This is critical and is aligned with the national prioritisation framework for phase 1 of the national vaccine roll-out program.

“Despite limited planning time and a change in implementation from the CoviShield to the J & J vaccine, the program has already vaccinated more than 3 000 healthcare workers from the private sector.

“This was only made possible through close co-operation between department of health officials, site staff, private sector leadership and the Sisonke program staff.”

He said the response from private healthcare professionals had been heartening and exceeded expectations across several sites.

“The confidence by healthcare workers in the vaccine and the protection it offers is evident in the queues and higher than planned demand from doctors and nurses across the country.”

Maja said the department noted that the surging demand from healthcare workers was mirrored in many other countries including the UK and India and was not necessarily unique to South Africa.

“We appreciate the patience of healthcare workers as we work tirelessly to roll out this large-scale program in record time.

“There are a number of process related issues the departments of health, private sector partners and the Sisonke program team are working towards resolving in real time to alleviate the wait times.”

Maja said they were confident that their partnership across public and private sectors would help to overcome these short-term process challenges and result in the health department being able to protect many healthcare workers in a shorter period of time.

“We are fully committed to protecting the vulnerable healthcare workers who have sacrificed so much over the past year, in putting themselves on the front line.

“They have dealt with so much loss, pain and tragedy and we see their desire to be vaccinated as an expression of their hope, confidence and optimism.”

He said the healthcare workers across the country were today breathing a sigh of relief and rebuilding much needed morale on the front line.

“We are deeply appreciative to many leaders across the health system who have so willingly volunteered their time and expertise to help this national effort and in the words of one clinician expressing this as their ‘Thuma mina’ moment for their country.”

He urged all healthcare workers to register at vaccine.enroll.health.gov.za.

“Liaise with your relevant GP group, specialist private groups, or hospital leadership to ensure you have appropriately completed your electronic registration and consent process resulting in an electronic token prior to attending one of the vaccination sites.”

Please bring with you your ID, e-voucher and mobile phone. This will allow for better planning and management of queues.

In Gauteng healthcare workers were assured by the health MEC Dr Nomathemba Mokgethi that none of them would be excluded from the national vaccination programme aimed at safeguarding the healthcare system in the province.

https://soundcloud.com/thato-mahope/motalatale-modiba-head-of-communication-gauteng-department-of-health-speaks-on-vaccination

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