Health Minister, Zweli Mkhize while giving an update on the government’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout strategy on Sunday, December 3, said they expect manufacturers to deliver COVID-19 vaccines as early as next month, and priority will be given to frontline care workers. 

He said “We’re trying as much as possible to get some vaccines to be available much before that date, we are targeting February, all of that will depend on the success of current bilateral negotiations we’re having with various companies. It is clear that the second wave that we are going through is affecting us to levels which are even higher than in the earlier stage, the only way to deal with the Covid-19 not only in South Africa but throughout the world is the provision of the immunity through the vaccination,”

This comes  a week after the South African government paid a deposit of 15.8 million euros to enter Covax, the mechanism for the equitable distribution of vaccines established by the UN World Health Organisation

The country plans to vaccinate 67 per cent of its population of 59 million people, in order to achieve sufficient collective immunity to contain the spread of the coronavirus.

He said the man returned home on 1 March and was isolated due to the symptoms he was showing when he went for check up.

His statement read: “This morning, Thursday 5 March, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) confirmed that a suspected case of coronavirus has tested positive. The patient is a 38-year-old male who travelled to Italy with his wife. They were part of a group of 10 people and they arrived back in South Africa on 1 March 2020. The patient consulted a private general practitioner on 3 March, with symptoms of fever, headache, malaise, a sore throat and a cough. The practice nurse took swabs and delivered it to the lab. The patient has been self-isolating since 3 March. The couple also has two children. The Emergency Operating Centre (EOC) has identified the contacts by interviewing the patient and doctor. The tracer team has been deployed to KwaZulu-Natal with epidemiologists and clinicians from NICD. The doctor has been self-isolated as well, as she may have picked up coronavirus too.”