Tweet

Mia Malan

13 May, 9 tweets, 6 min read

[Thread] 1. VACCINE ROLL-OUT UPDATE from the Western Cape: Keith Cloete, the head of the WC health department says the province today received just over 30 000 doses of the 1st batch of (325 260) Pfizer #CovidVaccines that arrived in SA on May 2.

@WestCapeHealth

2. .@WestCapeHealth expects to receive #JandJ jabs from May 28. Deliveries of both #Pfizer + J&J will be made each week (the nr of doses will increase with time — in line with national deliveries: SA will get 300 000 Pfizer doses each week in May and 600 000+ each week in June).

3. What will the 30 000 #Pfizer jabs in the WC be used for? To vaccinate #HealthWorkers not covered by the Sisonke trial and people of 60+ in old-age homes. So phase 2 (people of 60+) will start off in old-age homes, not at individual sites. When? Monday, 17 May.

4. When can people of 60+ in the WC expect to get text messages that notify them about where + when to get #COVID19 jabs? In 2 - 3 weeks, Keith Cloete says. Why only then? They're starting off with block bookings in old-age homes + individual sites for #HealthWorkers.

5. What proportion of people of 60+ in the WC has registered on the EVDS? 27% of the 720 000 people over 60 in the province. The district that has done the best with registrations is Overberg: 44% of people over 60 in that district has registered.

6. #HealthWorkers who live in the Cape Metro will be able to get #COVID jabs at the sites below from Monday. People of 60+: For the next 2-3 weeks, only old age homes will be covered + a small group of people who will be personally invited to go to sites (to test them out).

@WestCapeHealth

7. How will the vaccinations at old-age homes work? @WestCapeHealth worked with the social development dpt to get the names of those in homes. So far, they've registered 60 000 residents on the EVDS and have made block bookings. Outreach teams will go to the homes.

8. When will the WC start opening up more sites? No specific dates, but sites will be phased in gradually:
* There will 204 sites - 70 of them in the City of Cape Town and the rest in rural districts
* Public sites will open first
* There will be weekly announcement re sites

9. How can you register on the EVDS?
1. Go to westerncape.gov.za or vaccination.health.gov.za/#/
2. Dial *134*832# from a cell phone and follow the instructions (you don't have to pay for the data you use to do this)
3. WhatsApp the word "register" to 0600 123 456

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More from @miamalan

Mia Malan

@miamalan

13 May

[Thread] 1. Why did the #Sisonke trial researchers broaden the definition of #HealthWorkers who can get vaccinated and are people using it to jump the queue (so are non-health workers queuing up to get vaccinated)?

2. The #JandJ doses for the #Sisonke study are research doses specifically donated to vaccinate trial participants (#HealthWorkers). The trial ends on 15 May and unused doses would have to be returned to J&J.
Source: Keith Cloete, WC health dpt

3. Because #Sisonke doses can only be used for the trial, leftover doses can't be given to Phase 1B (#HealthWorkers not covered by Sisonke) or Phase 2 (people of 60+) of the roll-out. Sisonke either has to use the doses/return leftover ones.
Source: Keith Cloete, WC health dpt

Read 11 tweets

Mia Malan

@miamalan

12 May

[Thread] 1. LATEST on #COVID19SA cases:
1. There was a 46% increase in new cases when the weeks of April 26th + May 3rd are compared.
2. Cases in all provinces increased in the last 7 days:
- Northern Cape: 68%
- Gauteng: 63%
- Limpopo: 47%
- North West: 42%
- Western Cape: 39%

2. #Covid19SA deaths increased by:
* 18.22% when the weeks of April 26th and May 3 are compared
* But when the last 14 days are compared, deaths decreased by about 30%
* KZN and the Western Cape account for 8 out of every 10 reported deaths

3. What about #HealthWorkers?
- They constitute 3.51% of all reported #COVID19SA cases
- Since the start of the pandemic, just over 56 000 have tested positive (there were 25 cases in the past 7 days)
- 874 health workers have died (1.56% of all cases)

Read 6 tweets

Mia Malan

@miamalan

2 May

[Thread] 1. Just before midnight on Sunday, SA will receive its first batch of commercial #CovidVaccines: 325 260 #Pfizer doses (enough to fully vaccinate 162 630 people - each person needs 2 doses).

2. A small study of 800 people has shown that the #Pfizer jab is 100% effective in protecting against falling ill with #COVID19 in SA (the trial was conducted while the #501YV2 variant was the most common form of the #COVID virus circulating in SA). bit.ly/3eReBtU

3. What will happen to the #Pfizer doses when they touch down at OR Tambo? They'll be transported to a central warehouse. Samples of the doses will then be selected and transported to Bloemfontein to the National Control Lab so they can be tested for quality.

Read 10 tweets

Mia Malan

@miamalan

26 Apr

@ZweliMkhize

[Thread]. 1. This morning @ZweliMkhize announced that the Sisonke trial, which uses #JohnsonandJohnson’s #COVID19 jab, will resume on Wednesday. So what happens now?

@SAHPRA1

2. Up until now, the Sisonke trial has vaccinated about 300 000 #HealthWorkers. @SAHPRA1 paused the trial in April, after the FDA/CDC in the US temporarily halted its #JandJ roll-out due to the occurrence of 8 rare blood clotting disorders among about 7 million vaccinated people.

3. None of the blood clots that occurred in the US, occurred in SA's Sisonke trial (likely because it’s so rare and we’ve only vaccinated about 300 000 people vs. the US’s 7 mil). The US unpaused its #JandJ roll-out on Fri after the FDA cleared the jab. bit.ly/2PsRgGA

Read 19 tweets

Mia Malan

@miamalan

22 Apr

[Thread] 1. Just in from Wednesday's cabinet briefing:
* The #CovidVaccine roll-out is still scheduled to start on May 17.
* There are now 3 338 vaccination sites (a list with the names hasn't been released).

@SAHPRA1

2. When will can we start to use the 31 million #JohnsonandJohnson jabs that we've bought and will the first 1 million (from Aspen in SA) still land this week? We don't know. Neither @SAHPRA1 (our regulator; it needs to authorise use) nor @healthZA have made an announcement.

3. What do we know? Sahpra has recommended that the Sisonke trial (it uses J&J jabs) should resume. But before that can happen, Sahpra has to approve new docs submitted by the researchers (the study has to adhere to new rules set by Sahpra, e.g. better screening for blood clots).

Read 8 tweets

Mia Malan

@miamalan

16 Apr

[Thread] 1. Stravos Nicolaou (from Aspen and SA's vaccine oversight committee): Phase 2a (people of 60 and older) and Phase 1b (health workers getting commercial vaccines) of our roll-out will run concurrently.

2. Stravos Nicolaou: Soon, SA will significantly ramp up the number of people vaccinated per day. We'll do two things: open up many more vaccination sites than what the Sisonke study had and have many more deliveries of #CovidVaccines.

3. Stravos Nicolaou: SA's #CovidVaccine pipeline: In total we've procured 61 million vaccine doses: 31million J&J, 30 million Pfizer - they will arrive over the course of 2021. We also have 500 000 Pfizer doses coming from COVAX.

Read 4 tweets

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