We'll Only Vaccinate South Africans - Mkhize
South Africa’s Health Minister, Zweli Mkhize has said South African nationals only will receive COVID-19 vaccines when the country starts the rollout process.
He made the remarks as the country expects to take delivery of its first batch of COVID-19 vaccines which were procured from India.
Mkhize also said the vaccination will be voluntary. Millions of foreign nationals from across Africa and yonder reside in South Africa and are likely to miss out on the vaccine. He said:
No one will be forced to vaccinate. Actually, we will promote it, we will explain for people to know it’s beneficial and we would like people to take their own decision on that and when you take the vaccine you sign consent so it’s clear that you consented to it.
All you need when you go is to show that you have got an ID. You are a South African registered voter. For those who are undocumented, we are not able to deal with that because at the moment we would like to be able to deal with people based on the SA registration. So at this point, we have no plan to deal with those that are not documented.
While there has been a reduction in COVID-19 admissions in a number of provinces including Gauteng and the Western Cape, South Africa remains the most affected African country.
Mkhize said about 70 percent of the total population needs to be vaccinated to weather the coronavirus storm.
More: SABC News
