Nothing 'devilish' about the Covid-19 vaccine – KZN Education MEC Kwazi Mshengu

• KwaZulu-Natal has kicked off its vaccination rollout programme for teachers in KwaMashu.
• The province is expected to vaccinate 127 000 education department employees at 70 vaccination sites.
• Education MEC Kwazi Mshengu has assured teachers that the vaccine is safe.

As KwaZulu-Natal began its Covid-19 vaccination rollout on Wednesday morning, provincial education department officials reassured teachers that Covid-19 vaccines were safe.

"There is nothing to worry about. The vaccination is safe and there is nothing devilish about it. We won't get any demons or whatever. In fact, you will be much safer. We are calling on educators and support staff to come up and vaccinate," Education MEC Kwazi Mshengu said.

Mshengu was at a vaccination site at the KwaMashu Sports Centre where education stakeholders, including unions and school governing body representatives, joined him. And their message was clear: Take the vaccine if you are a teacher.

"We are speaking in one voice asking educators to present themselves for vaccination. It is a good thing to do and there is nothing wrong with it. While it is a voluntary act, we are calling on everyone to play his or her part in making sure we reach herd immunity in the country.

"We expect educators to be on the forefront of communicating a positive message about why it is important for people to vaccinate so that we deal with the theories and needs in society."

Teachers going to be vaccinated during the first day of the vaccination rollout in the education sector.

Darren Stewart/Gallo Images

The province is expected to vaccinate 127 000 education department employees and has identified 70 vaccination sites so far.

The MEC said the department would provide daily updates on vaccination numbers.

SA Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu) provincial secretary Nomarashiya Caluza said it appeared that vaccination sites disregarded "the vastness of the education districts in KZN".

"Any reasonable person would have understood that the education department is the largest in terms of number of schools and number of workers. Therefore, increasing the number of vaccination sites would assist the vaccination programme to be rolled out within the stipulated timeframes."

She said information from their regional structures indicated that districts "are not at the same level of readiness".

"They [the department] can't provide the required information which our regional leaders need for them to be able to guide teachers and other education workers as they continue to ask their leaders about where they should go for them to be vaccinated. This is a gap created unnecessarily."

Teacher getting vaccinated during the first day of the vaccination rollout in the education sector.

Darren Stewart/Gallo Images

The union said it appreciated the hard work in some districts, where officials communicated timeously, developed clear plans and were inclusive in their planning.

"Sadtu believes that in these districts, the vaccination of teachers and education workers will start smoothly."

Mshengu said they were aware of the issues Sadtu mentioned.

"We explained to them that we are working with the constraints of the capacity of the Department of Health. This is not an ordinary vaccination programme. To mitigate the distances for some schools to travel to get to vaccination centres, we have given concessions for them to close for a day so that educators can travel and get vaccinated."