Free State health MEC Montseng Tsiu on Sunday said the province was ready to vaccinate more than 288,000 of its vulnerable citizens. 

“We have received our vaccines and we are ready to start,” Tsiu said during the launch of phase two of the national Covid-19 vaccine rollout.  

“The total number of the population we are targeting for phase two is 288,240. So far 37,741 people have registered for inoculation.”

The department will open two vaccination sites in two different districts and targeting old age homes.

To encourage people to register, Tsiu said the department was conducting loud hailing in townships and using community health workers in a door-to-door campaign.

“The Red Cross social development department are helping us. We are also using  community radio stations and teaching people to use their smartphones to register online at home because we want to get as many people as possible registered.”

One of the districts that will be targeted is Mangaung, said Tsiu.

 “The other districts will wait for us to get more doses of the vaccine.”

Tsiu said there was an ongoing campaign to encourage people to register.

The department will also head to old age homes in Harrismith and Thaba ’Nchu.

Traditional leaders and the provincial premier will receive their jabs this week.

TimesLIVE reported earlier that the number of Covid-19 infections during the week of May 3 to 9 showed an overall 46% increase compared to the previous week (April 26 to May 2), said the National Institute For Communicable Diseases (NICD).

The Northern Cape (68%), Gauteng (63%) and Limpopo (47%) topped the list of provinces with new cases. 

There has also been an increase in hospital admissions, and deaths related to Covid-19  increased by 18% compared to the previous week, with the Eastern Cape and Western Cape (both 21%), Gauteng (20%) and KwaZulu-Natal (19%) accounting for 81% of all reported fatalities. 

The NICD said Free State was now experiencing a third wave of infections.

TimesLIVE