MEC Lesufi urges education sector workers in Gauteng to vaccinate
23 June 2021
Gauteng’s MEC for Education, Mr Panyaza Lesufi, today made an impassioned plea to education sector (staff and non-staff) officials to get their COVID-19 vaccination jabs; saying the Department “appreciated and endorsed” the decision to prioritise the sector in this phase of the vaccination rollout.
The MEC was speaking at the first day of the vaccination drive at Rabasotho Community Hall, Tembisa, where, together with senior education officials, he received his vaccination jab. The event was also attended by the Minister of Basic Education, Mrs Angie Motshekga and the Deputy Health Minister, Dr Joe Phaahla.
“If you check the [COVID-19 infection] numbers that are increasing in our schools, you will see that it is very important that we protect our educators. Every learner comes from a family and goes back to that family and you don’t want the child to be carrying the virus to the family. If you can protect the children; you can protect everyone,” MEC Lesufi said.
More than 125 934 workers in the education sector in Gauteng are expected to get vaccinated in the ten days between 23 June and 8 July 2021. Of that total, 71 726 are educators at Gauteng public schools; 24 492 are non-educators such as clerks, food handlers and teacher union staff, among others. A total of 10 488 School Governing Body-appointed educators and Grade R practitioners in public schools are also eligible for the shots. The remainder – 19 678 – is made up of educators from independent schools.
We are happy with progress made at all our 60 sites in Gauteng as no major glitches reported beside a few challenges that were quickly attended to.
MEC Lesufi also thanked the Department of Health for acquiring the vaccine and prioritising the education sector in this phase of the rollout.
We appreciate and endorse the decision to ensure that educators are protected. That is why as the education sector we are committing ourselves that we will cherish this opportunity and ensure that we complete the roll-out in the timeframe given. We know the queue for the vaccine is long and do not want to add to the delays.
While vaccination is voluntary, the Department of Health highly recommends that all in the sector vaccinate so that everyone is protected from COVID-19, especially those with comorbidities as vaccination jabs are said to reduce the severity of illness and possible hospitalisation in the case of one contracting the virus.
Further, those who contracted Covid-19 in the past 30 days; those who were vaccinated using another vaccine (Pfizer or using J&J under Sisonke); and those who vaccinated for flu in the past 14 days are not eligible for the jab.
We urge those who had been vaccinated to continue adhering to non-pharmaceutical health and safety protocols, including social distancing; regular washing or sanitising of hands and wearing a mask.
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No ‘wrong jabs’ for our educators – GDE
The Gauteng Department of Education (GDE) would like to correct misleading media headlines insinuating that some of its sites provided the education sector workers with ‘wrong jabs’.
It needs to be noted that some of the sites allocated for the vaccination of the education sector workers in Gauteng also administer the vaccine under the Health Department’s campaign to vaccinate those over the age of 60.
For the record, the education sector workers are being inoculated with the Johnson & Johnson single dose jab; while the over-60s campaign is being rolled out using the Pfizer vaccine.
The miscommunication which took place related to the delivery of the vaccine to the incorrect section at the correct site; and the matter was swiftly resolved before any vaccine was administered to any of our employees.
Statements issued by the Gauteng Department of Education, 23 June 2021
