US donors and healthcare organisation BroadReach have launched a rural Covid-19 vaccination drive to improve coverage rates among some of SA’s most vulnerable communities in Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal.
The two provinces have among the lowest inoculation rates in SA, with the proportion of adults who have received at least one shot dipping as low as 12% in some sub-districts. The national figure stands at 48%, with coverage highest in the Free State (57.3%) and the Western Cape (55.6%), according to official government figures. Inoculations are lowest in KwaZulu-Natal (41.5%) and Mpumalanga (42.2%).
The main barriers to getting vaccinated in rural areas include not knowing where to go, difficulty getting to vaccine sites, and high travel costs, according to studies by the University of Johannesburg and the Human Research Council.
But BroadReach, which since January has vaccinated more than 8,000 people in deep rural areas, has also found it helps to offer vaccination alongside other health services so people do not need to take additional time off work. “Often here there is a culture of no work no pay, so if someone is attending a health facility for TB or HIV services, why not offer them a Covid-19 vaccine too,” said BroadReach chief of party Dhirisha Naidoo.
BroadReach works with provincial health departments, which are providing both Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson shots to communities in rural areas, she said.
It has prioritised the Ugu and King Cetshwayo districts in KwaZulu-Natal, which both had a 23% vaccination rate on February 22, and Gert Sibande and Nkangala in Mpumalanga, which had vaccination rates of 24% and 21%, respectively The vaccination drive in Mfolozi municipality in King Cetshwayo district had reached just 12% of adults.
The Covid-19 vaccination drive is an extension of the US Agency for International Development’s (USAID’s) long-running support for HIV and tuberculosis (TB) programmes in SA. “To tackle the triple threat of HIV/Aids, TB and Covid-19, we are tapping into our trusted local networks with partners like BroadReach Health Development and other partners who deeply understand the context of the communities they serve,” said Andy Karas, USAID mission director for Southern Africa.
“These teams understand many of the local barriers fuelling low vaccination rates and can support their communities to get vaccinated,” he said.
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