President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday urged multilateral and philanthropic organisations to procure Covid-19 vaccines from African producers to ensure the continent retains its fledgling manufacturing capacity.
“International agencies that have had a lot of money donated [to them] for purchasing and procuring vaccines for developing economy countries are not buying vaccines from African vaccine manufacturers, even for those destined for African countries. This must change,” he said in an address to the second Global Covid-19 summit. The virtual summit was hosted by the US, Germany, Senegal, Belize and Indonesia.
Ramaphosa’s remarks follow a warning from SA’s biggest pharmaceutical manufacturer, Aspen Pharmacare, that it might have to close its vaccine production line and news that state-backed vaccine manufacturer Biovac may scale back its plans to bottle Pfizer’s jab due to lack of orders.
Aspen bottles Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 shot, and planned to make its own copy of the jab, branded Aspenovax, for the African market. But it has so far received no orders, despite Africa’s low vaccination coverage. Barely 17% of Africa’s population is fully vaccinated, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Two-thirds of Africa’s vaccines have been procured by the WHO-backed scheme Covax, which said last week it did not plan to buy any more shots at this stage because administering them is progressing so slowly. It bought its supplies before African vaccine manufacturers ramped up production.
Ramaphosa told the summit SA will donate 15-million doses of coronavirus vaccines to other African countries, 5-million of which will be Pfizer, and the rest J&J shots. The government has a huge stockpile of vaccines, as demand for shots has fallen far short of its expectations. Only 49.2% of the adult population has had at least one dose, and millions of Pfizer doses expire at the end of July.
Weekly vaccination numbers have plummeted from an August 29 peak of just more than 1-million to slightly more than 34,000 in the week to May 15.
SA’s vaccination programme has continued to flag even as coronavirus cases surged in recent weeks, rising to their highest daily level since January on Wednesday to 10,017. Hospitalisations and deaths, however, remain low. Slightly more than 3,000 patients are hospitalised with Covid-19, and intensive care admissions stand at 310.
The WHO said SA’s spike in infections, in which recorded cases quadrupled in the past three weeks, has driven a 32% increase in recorded cases in southern Africa in the week to May 8.
“This uptick in cases is an early warning sign which we are closely monitoring. Now is the time for countries to step up preparedness and ensure that they can mount an effective response in the event of a fresh pandemic wave,” WHO Africa director for emergency preparedness and response Abdou Salam Gueye said.
The spike in cases is being driven by two new sublineages of the omicron variant called BA.4 and BA.5, which were identified in April, and the easing of restrictions, he said.
The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said in the past week SA joined 11 other African countries that are in a fifth wave: Algeria, Benin, Congo, Egypt, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Mauritius, Somalia, Tunisia, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Health Minister Joe Phaahla has yet to officially declare SA to be in a fifth wave. Health department spokesperson Foster Mohale said the minister will do so “at the right time, and when there is sufficient scientific data”.
It is no longer appropriate to use the definition of a wave previously used in SA, as testing rates are low, many of the cases are reinfections, and there has been a decoupling of cases and hospitalisations, he said.
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