Despite fresh Covid-19 outbreaks, vaccination hesitancy is spreading in SA and other countries
SA response 'plagued by corruption and mismanagement', say researchers
The World Health Organisation has named vaccine hesitancy as one of the top 10 threats to global health — and yet it’s on the rise.
A new study led by South African researchers has shed light on the growing reluctance to be vaccinated in many parts of the world.
Talita Greyling of the University of Johannesburg and Stephanie Rossouw, formerly of North West University but now at the Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand, devised an attitude index based on tweets during six months from February last year.
Their research covered SA, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, the UK, France and Germany.
“The attitude improved in only two countries, namely Belgium and the Netherlands. For the remaining countries, the trend was negative over time,” the researchers said.
They looked at each country individually and said SA “faced problems such as capacity issues, mistrust in the government, and anti-vaccination campaigns”.
IN NUMBERS
• 466-million: Recorded global cases of Covid-19
• 6.07-million: Official global death toll
These contributed to growing scepticism about vaccines. “From as early as December 2020, it seemed that the [vaccination] strategy was haphazard,” they say.
On February 1 last year the first delivery of AstraZeneca was made to SA and even by then “it seemed that the government did not have a clear vaccination policy”.
The health ministry “created confusion” when it put the rollout on hold after it came to light that AstraZeneca “did not demonstrate efficacy against mild to moderate Covid”.
The decision raised the ire of local scientists and flew in the face of WHO advice, because the vaccine could still have prevented severe disease and death. Failure to use the AstraZeneca shots put 17-million high-risk people in a vulnerable position; during the winter months from June to September last year, Covid-19 was blamed for 25,660 deaths in SA.
The researchers say the vaccine mess could have been avoided “if the South African government had not been plagued by corruption and mismanagement during its response to the pandemic”.
By August 2021, vaccine apathy in the country was clear “as the number of people coming forward to be vaccinated dropped below 200,000 a day, falling short of the set target of 300,000”.
STILL RESISTING
• Various vaccine campaigns have been launched in the country over the past year, from Jabsb4Jols in the Western Cape, to the Vooma Vaccination weekends, to the youth-led KeReady campaign, but to date only 43% of the adult population is fully vaccinated
The researchers concluded in their study, published in science journal PLOS ONE, that the general “downward trend in positive attitudes is partly due to a fear of the side effects” but that “many other factors also contribute”.
These included procurement problems, corruption, resistance to mandatory vaccination and Covid-19 passports, and dissatisfaction with the government’s rollout plan.
However, local experts say SA has reached the point where a mandatory policy or passports are the only weapons left in trying to get enough people vaccinated.
Shabir Madhi, a professor of vaccinology at Wits University, told the Sunday Times: “Unvaccinated individuals are unlikely to be coming forward in large numbers unless there is some level of compulsion. An example is the requirement for mandatory vaccination in engaging in indoor gatherings.”
“In many countries, self-confessed hesitants said they were waiting for ‘the traditional vaccine’, which is a scientifically unsound term anyway. Now it is licensed there, and available, but they are still ‘hesitant’.”
Dr Stavros Nicolaou from Aspen Pharmacare said every effort should still be made to get people to vaccination sites.
“Although we are in a lull phase at the moment, we will invariably have other variants — we just don’t know the timing and severity — but another upsurge in the winter months is very likely. We want to avoid a variant that is destructive to both the economy and public health, and that is why vaccination is still needed.”
He said that if the government was reluctant to impose a policy of mandatory shots for all, “what works effectively is restricted access to venues”.
Foster Mohale, spokesperson for the department of health, told the Sunday Times this week the government was continuing “to explore various strategies to increase vaccine uptake”, but gave no details.
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