“The UA will distribute to those countries that have already expressed interest in acquiring the action,” South African Health Minister Zweli Mkhize told lawmakers in Cape Town on Tuesday.
Mkhize said the rumors about the shootings, which were bought at the Indian Serum Institute (SII), had expired and were returned to India “simply not true” and no money was wasted. .
“The recent announcement about the limited effectiveness of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which we had already purchased, was certainly disappointing; however, we were determined not to deviate from our commitment to launch vaccines in February,” Mkhize said. .
The Health Minister announced that the country had secured 9 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
“In fact, we have gotten enough doses to vaccinate all the people who will have to be vaccinated in South Africa,” Mkhize said.
South Africa is expected to give the green light to Johnson & Johnson vaccine and start administering doses this week.
The launch marks a 180-degree pivot for South Africa, which had received one million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine and was scheduled to begin administering doses to health workers in February. Another 500,000 doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca should be delivered by the end of the month.
Instead, South Africa has shifted to a new plan. It will begin vaccinating health workers with Johnson & Johnson traits in a research study. Officials will administer shots to health workers at 20 vaccination centers in each of the country’s nine provinces. To date, more than 380,000 health workers have been registered.
The first batch of 80,000 shots from Johnson & Johnson is expected this week, with 500,000 doses in the next four weeks, Mkhize said. This will be complemented by an additional 20 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine, scheduled for the end of March.
South Africa has been consulting scientists on what to do with the AstraZeneca vaccine following the news that two doses provided “substantially reduced” protection against mild to moderate Covid-19 disease of variant B.1.351.
Now seven more countries report variant B.1351 in Africa, including Ghana, Kenya, Comoros, Botswana, Mozambique and Zambia.
It was not clear in the study, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, whether the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine protected against serious diseases of variant B.1.351. The 2,000 participants in clinical trials were mostly healthy young adults and therefore unlikely to become seriously ill. But, based on the immune responses detected in their blood samples, the researchers said “there is still some hope” that the vaccine could protect against more serious cases.
AstraZeneca said recently that it is working with Oxford University to adapt the vaccine against variant B.1.351 and that it would advance through clinical development to make it “ready for autumn delivery if necessary”.
Professor Salim Abdool Karim, who is co-chair of South Africa’s Covid-19 advisory committee, had initially told CNN that the country would likely take a “step-by-step approach” in which they would assess the impact of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. deployment. But it seems that now the country has completely eliminated this strategy.
As for the future role of Oxford-AstraZeneca in South Africa, Mkhize only said that health officials would continue to be guided by experts and led by science.
It is a big blow to the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which has been hailed for its low cost and easy storage as one of the best hopes in the world to defeat the virus.
The COVAX program, a coalition that includes Gavi and the World Health Organization with the goal of distributing Covid-19 vaccines to the poorest countries, depends on the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine.
Earlier this month, COVAX announced a plan to distribute more than 337 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine worldwide, of which 336 million doses are the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine and only 1.2 million doses are the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.
“While a vaccine that protects against all forms of Covid-19 disease is our greatest hope, preventing serious cases and hospitalizations that overwhelm hospitals and health systems is crucial,” Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO regional director for Africa, at a news briefing on Thursday.
The second wave of Covid-19 in Africa, which peaked in January, was more deadly than the first wave, according to Dr. Moeti.
With the launch of vaccines, “if the cases remain mild and moderate and do not require critical care, we can save many lives,” he added.
CNN’s David McKenzie contributed to this report.