Africa is lagging far behind the world in Covid-19 vaccinations and will fail to make its target of 60% of people protected by the end of 2022, if it continues at this pace, warned Dr John Nkengasong, director of the Africa CDC, on Thursday from Cape Town.
Just more than half of the 43.5 million vaccines delivered to the continent have gone into people’s arms, covering a mere 1.67% of its people with a single dose.
“We need to speed up and scale up vaccinations — fairly,” he urged countries at his weekly briefing.
A shortfall in the supply of vaccines — particularly the 140 million doses which were due from India and have not been delivered — lack of funding for rollout programmes and vaccine hesitancy are among the obstacles delaying vaccinations on the continent.
More than 4.7 million people had have been infected by Covid-19 on the continent and 129,300 had died by Thursday.
Nkengasong — who has visited Rwanda and Cameroon in the past month — was in SA to meet health leaders and learn about its vaccination programme and its acquisition of vaccines.
He also met with private sector allies, such as MTN and companies like Biovac, about supporting inoculations against coronavirus.
“SA has brought in private sector partnership to help scale up vaccinations,” he noted.
“Second, I went to look at vaccine production at the Aspen facility in Gqeberha. I was emotional, felt joy, to hold a vial of the J&J vaccine in my hand. This vial could save lives ... That was really heart warming.”
I went to look at vaccine production at the Aspen facility in Gqeberha. I was emotional, felt joy, to hold a vial of the J&J vaccine in my hand. This vial could save lives ... That was really heart warming.
SA, Senegal, Egypt, Morocco and Rwanda have been identified as hubs for vaccination production by the EU, which has set aside €1.2bn (R20.2bn) to make this a reality.
“Africa consumes 25% of all vaccines in the world and it imports 99% of its vaccines. We aim to get to producing 60% of our vaccines,” said Nkengasong.
But right now, raising funds to roll out vaccination programmes is a challenge for countries, said Dr Thabani Maphosa, country programmes MD at Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
The World Bank estimates African countries will need $12bn (R165.5bn) to procure and distribute Covid-19 vaccines, and a number of countries are in discussion with the bank, he said.
He urged countries to increase their uptake of vaccines and tackle a surge in vaccine hesitancy linked to fake news and pauses on the AstraZeneca and J&J shots earlier this year.
“Vaccine hesitancy is variable between countries and within countries,” said Maphosa.
Nkengasong said that hesitancy fluctuated. For example, the demand in Nigeria for vaccinations dropped initially and then rose again.
“Any delay in vaccinations costs not just lives but the economy ... vaccinations are our most important tool to economic recovery,” he said.
The continent needs to be increasingly vigilant about new infections, given the rising number of cases in about 10 countries, said Dr Matshidiso Moeti, director of the WHO Africa region on Thursday.
“In my city I do a survey every Saturday morning and the fatigue is visible. People are not wearing their masks. I was hoping this would be horrifying, like not being dressed in public but people are tired of masks and social distancing,” she said.
New infections reported have stayed stable during the past month but Central and Southern Africa are reporting a 136% increase and 21% increase on average respectively.
North Africa’s cases are the same (0.4% decrease), while East Africa is reporting a 17% decrease and West Africa an 11% decrease on average from April 26 to May 23.
SA has the highest increase in new cases on average, at 14%, among the most populous countries. The numbers are:
- SA: 14% increase
- Egypt: 7% increase
- Ethiopia: 18% decrease
- Kenya: 18% decrease
- DRC: 21% average decrease
- Nigeria: 17% average decrease.
Deaths have gone up by 1% on average and Africa’s case fatality rate remains higher than the global average at 2.7%, compared to 2.1%.
“The situation in India is not inevitable in Africa. We can avoid it, especially if we are implementing measures like not allowing mass gatherings for political or religious events,” she said.
Africa needs to prepare for a next wave and rapidly increasing its critical care capacity, said Moeti. The global average is two beds per 100,000 people and only nine countries in Africa can match this.
Nkengasong encouraged countries to make sure they had enough oxygen available, so that the continent does not suffer the same crisis as in India.
He urged all countries to increase prevention measures against the virus and their surveillance of hotspots and variants.
The risk of Covid-19 becoming an endemic disease as a result of slow vaccinations was of “greatest concern”, said Nkengasong.
Both he and Moeti thanked countries with excess doses for being willing to share them with the continent.
Nkengasong said: “We need countries sitting on excess vaccines to redistribute them quickly, in the interests of not just Africa but humanity as a whole.”
