Tshwane health reaches over one million fully vaccinated individuals despite robberies, vaccine hesitancy

Although Tshwane metro has been one of the leading regions with fully vaccinated individuals, it still battles with community vaccine hesitancy.

In January, the region reached what the health department described as a “milestone” with over one million individuals fully vaccinated. Out of 2 716 998 eligible individuals the metro had 1 044 321 fully vaccinated people with over 1 873 491 vaccines administered.

Despite the programme having experienced two robberies and other challenges, the region had the second highest vaccines administered in Gauteng.

Speaking to Rekord on Tuesday, Tshwane primary healthcare manager Dr Mpho Moshime-Shabangu said reaching over one million vaccinations was achieved through a team effort. Health workers paddled through the Covid-19 storm and social stakeholders such as churches, schools, government departments, community organisations and private companies supported the rollout to ensure the vaccination reached communities.

The community vaccine programme kick-started on May 17, 2021 with only six vaccination sites in the region. Eight months later, the region had over 60 vaccination sites.

“It is really a milestone reaching over one million vaccinated individuals. When looking back where we started and where we are now, we are happy,” Moshime-Shabangu said.

She said more people still needed to get vaccinated to reach the 70% target.

“Vaccine hesitancy is still there,” Moshime-Shabangu said.

“People are hesitant but when you give them more information, answer their questions and clear their doubts you see their fears being alleviated.”

ALSO READ : Covid-19: Tshwane elderly vaccine rush waning as fourth wave imminent

Moshime-Shabangu said the programme also faced the problem of fake news.

“During one of the vaccine rollouts with the transport ministry at Phomolong taxi rank, one of the men told me they heard the vaccination would affect their manhood. Those are the things that cause hesitancy and we need to clarify.”

She appealed to the public to get information from authentic sites when doing research on vaccines.

ALSO READ: Gauteng men duck vaccination in large numbers

Moshime-Shabangu said the department would continue with educational programmes on local radio stations and partnering with the media to enhance vaccine awareness.

LOW VACCINE INTAKE IN THE 18-35 GROUP :

“Our young people have the mentality that they are young and their immune system is strong. They feel that they will not get severely sick when they are infected,” she said.

“We do not know how the virus will develop and the behaviour of it.

“We need to acknowledge that people have different immune systems and it is not only the elderly that end up in hospital. We had young people in hospital because of Covid-19, it was sad having a 28-year-old in ICU and dying from the virus.”

Moshime-Shabangu said vaccination was important for all eligible groups.

DEPARTMENT SPEAKS ON THE REVAMP OF VACCINE DRIVE :

Tshwane had an average vaccine intake during the festive season, but Moshime-Shabangu said the health department wanted a revamp in their numbers.

“We will also continue with having pop-up vaccination sites at taxi ranks and shopping malls. We are not relaxing, we still have to push.”

She said the metro would also vaccinate residents at churches when requested to.

“Most churches support our programme but we still do have some of the faith-based organisations that still do not believe in vaccinations. We do not force anyone as this is not mandatory yet.”

ALSO READ :Tshwane record drop in Covid numbers

Like other health workers, Moshime-Shabangu said she believed the low number of hospitalisations and severe illness related to Covid-19 during the fourth wave was due to vaccination uptake in the province.

“As more people get vaccinated we know that our lives can get back to normal.”

THE NUMBER ONE VACCINE SITE IN TSHWANE :

Meanwhile, Moshime-Shabangu shed a spotlight on the Eersterust Community health centre which had one of the best vaccine intakes in Tshwane with 57 527 doses administered.

She said this was owed to clinic staff who worked hard at being innovative at trying to get people vaccinated.

“The team is led by Dr Delene Murray. She was a pioneer from the beginning and set-up the vaccination site with the facility manager sister, Inez da Gama.

“The team from the beginning was so hands-on, innovative, the facility also had a vaccine drive-thru and even went out for pop-up vaccinations,” she said.

“We had workplaces that requested vaccination of staff and they would go. The nurses, cleaners and doctors were all supportive of the vaccination and this is owed to them.”

Life Die Wilgers hospital and Menlyn Park Dis-Chem pharmacy in the east of Pretoria were also among top sites.

Least performing sites included Rayton areas, Cullinan, Rethabiseng, Lyttleton Chamber and Saulsville Arena.

As one of the biggest health programmes, the rollout started from challenging times of not having enough human resources.

Moshime-Shabangu said over 100 nurses were hired through contracts and nearly 100 admin staff to assist people with vaccine registrations through collaborations with stakeholders.

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