As SA’s coronavirus vaccination drive gathers pace, the government is exploring the scope for businesses and public amenities to demand proof of vaccination from patrons, health minister Joe Phaahla told parliament on Tuesday.
Phaahla said he was "quite certain" that once SA had attained sufficient vaccine coverage, business owners and the government could legally require the users of their facilities to be vaccinated.
"Our own preference would be for people to come voluntarily. But you can’t have your cake and eat it. If you want to enjoy your right not to be vaccinated, you can’t also say you have the right to put other people at risk," he told the National Council of Provinces.
People who had been vaccinated were less likely to transmit the virus if they became infected, because they had a lower viral load than people who had not been inoculated, Phaahla said.
The issue of vaccine passports has previously been flighted by Limpopo health MEC Phophi Ramathuba, who has been lobbying the liquor industry to sell only to people who have been inoculated.
SA has recorded more coronavirus cases and deaths than any other African nation but has so far fully vaccinated only 14.6% of its adult population. Its vaccination drive was initially hobbled by tardy and difficult negotiations with pharmaceutical companies and the failure of its initial vaccine of choice, the AstraZeneca shot, to demonstrate protection from infection with the Beta variant.
It began vaccinating health-care workers in February as part of a research study and began inoculating the general public only in mid-May. It then hit unexpected delays in the supply of the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, due to safety issues at one of its contractors, leaving it with limited supplies of the double-shot Pfizer regimen on hand and slowing the start of the mass inoculation drive.
As of August 30, SA had administered a total of 12.29-million vaccine doses, but only 5.8-million people out of a total adult population of 39.8-million were fully immunised.
Phaahla expressed concern about what he described as a "very strong, orchestrated and organised" campaign to discredit coronavirus vaccines, warning that the dissemination of "fake news" was a criminal offence in terms of the Disaster Management Act. Regulations to the act prohibit the publication of misinformation about Covid-19 on any medium, including social media and messaging platforms.
Phaahla conceded that the government’s response had been weak, saying it needed to step up its communication campaign about the safety and efficacy of Covid-19 vaccines.
"We can say with confidence, the vaccine results are resounding. As this third wave came, very few health workers have got sick, and very few ended up in hospital, in ICU or dying. We are not theorising when we say the vaccines are saving lives."
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