With many people wrapped up in Twosday yesterday, it served as a nice distraction from COVID-19 in South Africa. That said, today is equally significant as far as the country’s efforts to ramp up vaccinations is concerned.

This as the National Department of Health (NDoH) earlier this week outlined new changes to waiting periods between the first and second vaccine jabs, as well as the booster shot, all of which takes effect from 23rd February.

It still remains to be seen if halving the waiting time will prompt more people to head to vaccination stations across the country, but there is certainly a need to increase the number of people currently getting vaccinated.

Speaking of which, the latest vaccination numbers show that only 77 968 jabs were administered in the past 24 hours, which is a figure we definitely need to see surpass the 100k mark.

As of 17:00 on 22nd February 2022, a total of 31 123 187 vaccines have been administered across SA, with an estimated 17 628 002 people fully vaccinated at this stage.

Looking at the latest report from the NDoH on COVID-19 in South Africa, the past 24 hours has seen 2 334 cases recorded, as the total number of infections to date has reached 3 662 032. The department also notes that 64 fatalities have been reported too, with the death toll rising to 98 868.

The full outlook for COVID-19 in South Africa follows on below:

• COVID-19 Connect on WhatsApp – add 0600 123 456 as a contact and say “Hi”.
• World Health Organisation
• SA Coronavirus website
• SA Government
• SA Presidency

[Image – Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash]