Tanzania’s authorities have decided to join the UN-led COVAX vaccine supply platform after months of denial of the COVID-19 pandemic and refraining from having the population vaccinated. The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced that Tanzania was preparing to submit a vaccine request to COVAX and was working to develop a vaccine deployment plan.
“We have received information that Tanzania is now formally working to join the COVAX facility,” said Matshidiso Moeti, WHO’s regional director for Africa.
The step came soon after the election of Samia Suluhu Hassan as the Tanzanian president. His predecessor, John Magufuli, who died in March 2021, had denied that the pandemic existed in Tanzania as well as the necessity for vaccines, calling them part of a “Western conspiracy” and instead sought to rely on “God’s protection for Tanzania”. As the authorities have conducted a non-disclosure policy, it is difficult to estimate the extent of the pandemic in Tanzania. The last reported data goes back to April 2020 when the number of infections amounted to 509 and 16 deaths had been reported.
With a new administration at the helm of the country, mass immunization has now been very much brought to the table with Health Minister, Doroth Gwajima, calling for people to take precautionary measures against COVID-19 and wear masks, especially in crowded places.
According to Richard Mihigo from WHO’s Immunization and Vaccines Development Programme in Africa, Tanzania could receive its first shots within a couple of weeks.
Matshidiso Moeti urged the authorities to share coronavirus-related data “so that we can play the most effective role in helping – for example in targeting, in the planning, where to start, where to focus, that can only be done on the basis of evidence”.
Up until now, Zanzibar, a semi-autonomous part of Tanzania, has secured 10,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine which it received on 14 June. Mihigo said that “the vaccines are intended for pilgrims, frontline workers, hotel attendants, and people with co-morbidities.”
Home to almost 60 million people, Tanzania is one of the four African countries that have still not begun a vaccination campaign. So far, only about 1% of Africa’s population has been vaccinated. Up to 32 million people have received one dose and only 9.4 million Africans are fully vaccinated despite the fact that so far over 2.1 billion doses have been administered globally. WHO has warned that Africa will not be able to reach the target of inoculating 10% of Africans by September 2021. This is of particular concern now that the continent is experiencing a third wave of the pandemic with the number of cases being on the rise in 14 countries and new cases going up by more than 30% in eight countries.
