President Cyril Ramaphosa and Deputy President David Mabuza, who chairs the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Vaccines, will receive South Africa’s first consignment of Covid-19 vaccine on Monday, the Presidency said.
The first shipment of 1 million doses of the Oxford
University-AstraZeneca vaccine from the Serum Institute of India (SII) left the
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport in Mumbai on Sunday.
The vaccines are travelling on an Emirates plane via Dubai,
and will arrive at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg on Monday
afternoon.
According to the Presidency, Ramaphosa and Mabuza will be
joined at the arrival event by Minister of Health Dr Zweli Mkhize, Acting
Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, High Commissioner of the
Republic of India His Excellency Jaideep Sarkar and Dr Morena Makhoana, Chief
Executive Officer of Biovac.
“Biovac is a bio-pharmaceutical company that was formed in
2003 in a partnership between government and private investors to establish
local vaccine manufacturing capability. Biovac will play an important role in
the quality assurance, warehousing and distribution of Covid-19 vaccines,” the
Presidency said.
High Commissioner Sarkar will represent India as the
country of origin of the first vaccine to be rolled out in South Africa.
Mkhize has previously said the vaccines would first have to
go through strict quality assurance and stock control over a period of 10 to 14
days, before they are distributed across the country’s nine provinces.
A second shipment of 500 000 doses from SII is expected to
arrive later in February. South Africa will reportedly pay $5.25 (R77.67) per
dose for the 1.5 million shots.
The Health Department aims to vaccinate around 40 million
people by the end of the year, equating to around 67% of the population. If the
target is met, top scientists say the country would have achieved population
immunity.
The first phase of this rollout programme will prioritise
around 1.2 million frontline health workers.
“The arrival of the first consignment at OR Tambo
International Airport marks the start of the vaccine rollout which President
Ramaphosa describes as the largest and most complex logistical vaccine
undertaking in South Africa’s country’s history,” the Presidency said.
“The scale of delivery is unprecedented in terms of the
number of people who have to be reached within a short space of time.”
The Presidency said that Monday’s arrival event would be
brief, “with dignitaries witnessing airline, airport, health, customs and
security personnel perform their duties of ensuring that the vaccine
consignment is cleared and securely transported to its cold-room destination”.
IOL
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