TimesLIVE reports that Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize announced on Wednesday night that the plane carrying SA's first batch of Covid-19 vaccines would arrive in the country on 1 February.  

One million doses of the vaccine — from the Serum Institute of India (SII) — will leave India on 31 January, via Dubai, and arrive the following day at a time that has not yet been confirmed.  The vaccine concerned is the Aztra Zeneca vaccine — a product called “Covishield”.  Mkhize advised that the vaccines would have to go through a legally mandated quarantine period once they arrived in the country, and through quality assurance and reconciliation processes.  The latter involved checking how many doses had arrived, if any were broken, or how many had to be sent back.  “These are all necessary for the safe distribution of the vaccine. These processes will take a minimum of 10 days and maximum of 14 days,” Mkhize indicated.  Thereafter, “we will be ready to distribute to all provinces”.  He added that, from a regulatory standpoint, “we are cleared to move ahead with the rollout of the vaccine and the mass inoculation campaign”.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Matthew Savides at TimesLIVE

• Read too, SA’s first vaccines to arrive amid storm of criticism, at Moneyweb <https://www.moneyweb.co.za/news/south-africa/south-africas-first-vaccines-to-arrive-amid-storm-of-criticism/>

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