Health workers urged to get the jab as SA’s vaccine drive resumes on Wednesday
The South African Medical Association (Sama) has called on healthcare workers to register for the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccination Sisonke programme.
The use of the vaccines was suspended earlier this month following a similar decision by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the United States.
The reason for the suspension, given by both the FDA and Health Minister Dr. Zweli Mkhize, was to give authorities a chance to re-evaluate a possible causal link between the vaccine and six cases in America where women developed blood clots in the brain, coupled with low platelets.
Sama‘s Dr. Angelique Coetzee says following the two-week suspension in the vaccination drive, healthcare workers must register to get the jab.
"We are two weeks behind and we urge all our healthcare workers not yet registered to please register and this now includes their personnel like secretaries, like the staff working in surgeries so that phase 1B also can commence as quickly as possible.
"We are extremely happy and, but we notice that we have lost two weeks, we also acknowledge that it takes twenty-eight days to actually make antibodies against Covid-19."
Coetzee added that healthcare workers must be vaccinated as they were among the hardest hit at the beginning of the breakout.
“We cannot afford to lose our healthcare workers and we have already lost a lot of healthcare workers due to Covid-19 comorbidities around it," said Coetzee.
