Government clearly still does not have a proper vaccination programme in place

2 February 2021  

The few relaxations of the Level Three lockdown regulations, which were announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa were certainly necessary, moreover, the initial strict lockdown regulations could have been avoided altogether if better planning and preparation had been done.

The FF Plus finds it alarming that nothing new was announced regarding the vaccination roll-out programme. The President's announcements predominantly echoed the information that the Minister of Health (Zweli Mkhize) shared with the public last week.

It is still unclear which provinces and hospitals will be prioritised and which criteria will be used to determine how the vaccination programme will be executed.

The electronic systems that will, among other things, be used to make appointments to receive the vaccine, do not instil much confidence. Other projects that the government launched on the same basis, like the electronic application system for the special Covid-19 social relief grant of R350, experienced enormous problems with implementation.

Many South Africans do not have access to the internet and, thus, the notion that an electronic system will effectively reach the people is wishful thinking. This underscores the fact that at present, there exists no realistic strategy for a comprehensive vaccination programme.

Medical aids, and in effect the members of medical aids, are expected to subsidise those who are not members of medical aids while it is still unclear when the medical aid members themselves will be able to receive the vaccination.

The private sector is expected to make large donations to help the programme succeed, while the government's centralised approach prohibits the private sector from procuring vaccinations.

It is irrational to limit the number of people who may attend religious gatherings to just fifty, instead, the capacity of a venue should be used as measure to determine how many people are allowed to attend taking the required social distancing protocols into account.

The relaxation of certain restrictions, as announced, was certainly necessary. The move to a Level One lockdown could possibly have been made at this stage. The stringent measures have had an extremely negative impact on the economy and it could have been prevented if a generalised draconian approach to the lockdown was not followed.

Issued by Pieter Groenewald, FF Plus leader, 2 February 2021