Free State Health MEC, Montseng Tsiu, revealed her department’s audacious goal for Botshabelo as she kicked off Vooma week in the province in the populous and ever expanding township. The Vooma week, which began on 3 December, is set to conclude on 10 December, and comes as South Africa battles the Omicron Covid-19 variant. Tsiu speaks on the current vaccination statistics in Botshabelo.

Tsiu tells OFM News, that presently, only 33% of the Botshabelo population has received either the one dose Johnson & Johnson or the two dose Pfizer vaccines. This 33% translates to 43 755 people that are vaccinated presently. To get to their 70% target the department needs to inoculate 51 000 more Botshabelo residents. “We are certain that with the cooperation of the people who understand the benefits of vaccination, we will achieve this uphill target” concludes Tsiu.

The newly discovered Omicron variant is behind a severe spike in cases in the Gauteng province, which according to the National Institute of Communicable Diseases’ (NICD’s) latest figures accounts for 71% of the 16 366 new Covid-19 cases in the country. It is reported that 21 people have died in the country in the same period.

“The Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal each accounted for 6%. Mpumalanga accounted for 5%. Limpopo and North West each accounted for 4%. Free State and Eastern Cape each accounted for 2% and Northern Cape accounted for 1% of today’s new cases,” says the NICD.

The vaccination week comes after World Health Organisation (WHO) Secretary-General (SG) Tedros Adhanom, heavily criticised the developed world for the travel bans imposed on South African and Botswana in light of the new variant. Adhanom said in the briefing that the Omicron variant has been detected in 23 countries, and maintains that the backlog of tested cases would mean the number is much higher than that.

OFM News