Covid-19: Tshwane elderly vaccine rush waning as fourth wave imminent
“There is already talk of the fourth Covid-19 wave and the best we can do to mitigate the effects of that is to vaccinate.”
Far more people would need to be vaccinated if South Africa was to avoid a spike in coronavirus deaths in the predicted “fourth wave” of Covid-19 infections.
This was according to Gauteng modellers as the Tshwane region saw fewer elderly people queuing up to get their vaccinations.
Tshwane metro’s health MMC Sakkie du Plooy said he was concerned that the vaccine rush among older groups was waning.
“Although we have 43 vaccine sites throughout Tshwane and introduced the drive-thru, over the past three weeks the jab intakes have decreased.”
In Tshwane, only 40% of 316 487 people aged 60 and above have been vaccinated.
“We are concerned about this particularly for those over the age of 60 and over who are not vaccinated enough.”
Du Plooy said he was even more concerned that only 13% of people aged 50-59 were vaccinated in the region. The region’s target for the group was 312 229.
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“We are most concerned about the slow in-take on those groups as it is most affected when it comes to mortality.”
Du Plooy said the metro was engaging with church leaders and prominent people to encourage communities to vaccinate.
“There is already talk of the fourth wave and it will come sometime and the best we can do to mitigate the effects of that is to vaccinate.”
He said while they expected more to get vaccinated opening vaccination for those aged 18-35, he feared that the rush would again die down in three weeks.
“Only 64% of health workers have been vaccinated in the province. This shows that hesitancy also exists within health workers as they have not come out in the numbers we thought. We always see large groups of people coming to vaccinate when each group cohort is opened but that dies down after three weeks.”
Although modellers could not yet pinpoint when the fourth wave in infections would hit the province, it would happen, according to Gauteng provincial command council advisory committee member Professor Bruce Mellado.
“Unfortunately, there is going to be a fourth wave, but we cannot at this stage predict when it will hit,” he said.
While the province, including the Tshwane region, has over the past six weeks seen low infections, he said he was worried about the impact of neighbouring provinces, which continued to experience high infections.
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Mellado said an increase in infections in the Free State and KwaZulu-Natal, flagged to not have yet peaked, was a “big source of concern” as the provinces were interlinked.
He said the rise in community transmissions in the neighbouring provinces might trigger a fourth resurgence in infections for Gauteng.
Mellado said the only way to reduce Covid-related deaths in the expected fourth wave was to get more people vaccinated, especially people with underlying diseases as they were at high risk of becoming severely sick or dying when infected.
“Vaccination is a game-changer. We advise people, especially those with comorbidities to get vaccinated,” Mellado said.
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