Three experts believe that SA is likely to experience its third wave of the Covid pandemic in June or July. They are urging people to continue to adhere to safety protocol.
South African government puts vaccination programme on hold
Just one week after welcoming the arrival of the first batch of one million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has halted the rollout of the vaccine.
Compounding the political and economic crisis facing his African National Congress (ANC) government, the debacle threatens the political survival of the ANC.
Cyril Ramaphosa (credit: Tasnim News Agency)
The decision follows preliminary studies suggesting that the vaccine offered minimal protection against mild and moderate forms of disease caused by the new B1.351 coronavirus variant (also known as 501.V2) accounting for 90 percent of COVID-19 infections in South Africa. The new variant is now spreading across the world, although many countries lack the capacity to detect the new strain on a systematic basis.
Feb 15, 2021 // After a year where social distancing and Zoom fatigue became everyday phrases, a variety of vaccines were thought to promise the end of the coronavirus pandemic. For the first time since the pandemic began, cases have been declining in every region of the world; as Axios reports, the only number that has been rising is the number of vaccine doses administered worldwide. However, with a potential end to the pandemic in sight, a new element of this crisis threatens to jeopardize global progress thus far: viral variants.
Religious leaders support Covid-19 vaccine while pro-lifers insist aborted foetuses used in production
By Nathan Craig
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Discussion over whether Covid-19 vaccines contained aborted foetal DNA came up again this week at a webinar hosted by the Phoenix Settlement Trust and the Gandhi Development Trust on Covid-19.
However, leaders of religious institutions, have welcomed the vaccines and said they would lead by example.
Recently, the National Alliance for Life, a KZN-based pro-life umbrella body for organisations countrywide, claimed studies showed the use of aborted foetal cell lines in the vaccines
Albu van Eeden from Doctors For Life International conducted a presentation with the support of data from the pro-life Charlotte Lozier Institute in the US. The analysis was authored by the institute’s vice-president and research director, David Prentice, and it’s life sciences director Tara Sander Lee.