COVID-19 VACCINES & THE 501Y.

V2 VARIANT
TALKING POINTS
8 FEBRUARY 2021

We are committed to our nation’s vaccination drive.

• Our vaccination programme is a priority in our fight to prevent the spread of
the COVID-19.

• New information that the AstraZeneca vaccine is less effective against the
501Y.V2 variant will not deter our roll-out efforts.

• The planned phased roll-out of the vaccine will continue with the Johnson &
Johnson vaccine in mid-February.

• The Johnson & Johnson vaccine has proved effective against the COVID-19
501Y.V2 variant.

Our frontline health care workers will be the first to be vaccinated.

• Our vaccine rollout plan has not changed except that we will begin with the
Johnson & Johnson instead of AstraZeneca vaccine.

• The vaccine will be administered in Phase 1 to more than 1.2 million of our
frontline health care workers.

• The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is approved for study use in South Africa
and will be rolled out to health care workers as part of a research project.

• We have also secured doses from Pfizer for phase one and we are
continuing to engage all manufacturers to secure more doses

The fight against COVID-19 is dynamic.

• The mutation of COVID-19 means we have to consistently adapt to an ever

changing situation.

• We thank our scientists who made the breakthrough finding about the
efficacy of the AstraZeneca vaccine against the 501Y.V2 variant.

Page 1 of 3

 • This has allowed us to adapt to the situation and ensure that we give the
most appropriate vaccine to our people.

• Our vaccination campaign is guided by science and this means that we may
need to change the choice of vaccine we use from time to time

Our scientists continue to study the efficacy of AstraZeneca vaccine against

the 501Y.V2 variant.

• The AstraZeneca vaccine is safe and effective, and it is being used all over
the world.

• Our scientists are currently investigating if the vaccine will still be useful for
us in the country.

• If we use the vaccine, it will be before the expiry date in April. We will not
give anyone a vaccine that is expired

The AstraZeneca vaccine initially showed promise and was immediately

available.

• South Africa has sought to acquire vaccines from a number of sources,

including the global COVAX initiative.
• When it became clear that COVAX would deliver the vaccines later than
anticipated, we turned directly to the vaccine manufactures.
• The AstraZeneca vaccine was available on an urgent basis and, at that stage,
showed good results from the South African leg of the study
• People who received the vaccine were 75 per cent less likely to develop mild
to moderate cases of COVID-19 than were people who received a placebo.
• The emergence of a new more infectious variant in South Africa has changed
those findings.

Vaccines save lives!

• Vaccination is the best defence against serious illness and death.
• The vaccine does not give you the COVID-19 virus, rather it teaches your
immune system to recognise and fight the resulting infection if you were
infected with the coronavirus.
• The COVID-19 vaccine gives the body the instructions to build immunity, and
does not alter human cells as it does not in any way interact with or alter your
DNA.
• Vaccines have reduced the morbidity and mortality of infectious diseases,
such as smallpox, poliomyelitis, hepatitis B, measles, tetanus, whooping
cough and pneumococcus, across the world.

Page 2 of 3

 • It is possible to eliminate COVID-19 by ensuring that we vaccinate enough

people to achieve population immunity- but we all have to choose
vaccination.

Page 3 of 3