Authorities have been designing distribution and
vaccination prioritisation criteria strategies, with two extensive studies to
assess the country’s readiness for a rollout having been undertaken.Zimbabwe
has recorded 10 424 cases of Covid-19 and 8 754 recoveries and 280 deaths since
March.
Chief co-ordinator of the national response to the Covid-19
pandemic in the Office of the President and Cabinet, Dr Agnes Mahomva said last
week, preparations for deployment of vaccines was underway through a
multi-sectoral taskforce working in collaboration with the World Health
Organisation (WHO).
She said Zimbabwe would not deploy experimental vaccines
that have not been properly tested for safety.
“Zimbabwe will only rollout approved Covid-19 vaccines that
have been analysed and found to be effective and safe for use,” said Dr
Mahomva.
“Government is guided by science when deciding which
vaccines Zimbabwe will approve and use.”
Zimbabwe is part of a global ground-breaking initiative led
by WHO, known as Covax, which plans to secure and distribute millions of doses
of vaccines to African countries, once licensed and approved.
The initiative, which seeks to secure at least 220 million
doses for the continent, will enable the fast and equitable distribution of the
vaccines.
Through the Covax initiative, vaccines that pass regulatory
approval will be delivered equally to all participating countries in pro-port
to their populations.
Provisionally, the WHO distribution mechanism will allocate
vaccines to all countries until they have enough doses to cover 20 percent of
their population.
Zimbabwe has an estimated population of 16 million, meaning
the country could potentially get up to 3,2 million doses under the first
phase.
Our Harare Bureau has gathered that vaccination of
frontline health care workers and the elderly who are most vulnerable to the
contagion will be prioritised when the vaccines are deployed.
In addition to the Covax initiative, Government will also
mobilise domestic financial resources to procure additional jabs for the
country, said Dr Mahomva.
She said any vaccine authorised by the WHO under the Covax
facility would have to undergo rigorous regulatory scrutiny by local experts. “Let
me update you on two processes taking place in preparation for vaccine
deployment.
“There is an important aspect of research, which is part of
vaccine development, and is being led by National Institute of Health and
Research under the Ministry of Health and Child Care.
“Secondly, there are the actual rollout preparations,
including resource mobilisation for approved vaccines that have been analysed
and found to be effective and safe for use.
“On this front, Zimbabwe conducted its first baseline
readiness assessment on October 13, using the Covax facility template.
“A follow up assessment was conducted on the November 26
and both these assessments had the participation of the national Interagency
Coordination Committee on Immunisation and the Zimbabwe Immunisation Technical
Advisory Group.”
She said Government led the two studies in collaboration
with WHO, Unicef and various Covid-19 vaccination stakeholders.
“Results of these assessments have shown that Zimbabwe has
made good progress in preparing for the rollout of a safe and approved Covid-19
vaccine.
“More preparations are of course still in progress. These
additional preparations include finalisation of both internal funding mechanisms
through the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development and external funding
applications for the vaccine itself and of course for the actual rollout
processes.”
She said the preparations are informed by experiences from
the country’s Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI).
Added Dr Mahomva: “When Covid-19 was declared a global
pandemic it was clear that there was a need to develop not only safe vaccines
but also to ensure that everyone had access to these vaccines.
“This is because the introduction of vaccines will not end
the pandemic, if only a few countries have access to the vaccine.
“This realisation pushed the WHO, the Global Alliance for
Vaccines and Immunisation and other global leaders on immunisation such as
Unicef to come up with Covid-19 global access facility — in short Covax, to
address this issue.
“The Covax facility led by the WHO and GAVI is there to
accelerate the development and manufacture of safe and effective Covid-19
vaccines in order to guarantee rapid, fair and equitable access to vaccines for
all countries, once of course the vaccines have been confirmed safe, effective
and ready for deployment.”
Moderna, a US biotechnology company, has produced a vaccine
that it says provides nearly 95 percent immunity against the virus, while
another vaccine with almost equally the same efficacy has been produced by
Pfizer and its partner BioNTech.
Another vaccine developed by the University of Oxford
provides around 70 percent protection. China and Russia have already approved
vaccines, but both are yet to complete the final round of tests in people.
Sunday Mail
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