The government will not force people to vaccinate against COVID-19, said Deputy President David Mabuza last week (Thursday 31 March).
TimesLIVE reports that answering questions during a National Assembly sitting, he said that some of the minimum State of Disaster Level One regulations would remain “… but one thing we are not going to do is force people to go and vaccine (sic). We think that we would be crossing a red line.”
While the country was facing a looming fifth COVID wave, Mabuza believed that the number of vaccinated citizens was enough to provide protection. He said as of 28 March, the government had administered 33.5m vaccines to 20.9m people. This comprised 19.35m adults and 1.55m children aged between 12 and 17.
This meant 48.6% of adults had received at least one dose of the vaccine. “The coverage is not equal across all ages, with more than 68% of people 60 and older having being vaccinated compared with 35% of those aged 18-34.”
However, he added it was critical to vaccinate to further reduce the number of infections, hospitalisations and deaths.
“Poor demand for the uptake of the vaccines remains the largest barrier. However we are encouraged by the efforts of a number of sectors of society that have implemented policies and programmes aimed at increasing the demand for vaccines.”
He said: “We think the health regulations we are putting forward will continue to help manage the spread of this infection. We still insist on wearing masks when we are inside buildings, minimum distance of a metre and washing hands.”
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