Oxford AstraZeneca vaccines that arrived in South Africa last-week Monday has been reported to be less efficient and expected to expire soon.
Prof Shabir Madhi of Wits University revealed during a briefing that studies were done in the wake of the new variant – known as 501Y.V2 or B.1.351 – showed it was not statistically significantly effective against mild or moderate infection, but that it’s likely effective against “severe disease” caused by Covid-19.
Health Minister, Dr ZwelI Mkhize, confirmed that the AstraZeneca vaccine offered only limited protection against mild and moderate cases of the SA discovered COVID-19 variant. Hence, he temporarily halted the roll out of the 1 million vaccines.
Updates on the vaccines put fear in the minds of the people, and many have taken to social media to slam the Health minister.
