17 Aug 2021

A total of 4 055 people in Kanye Administrative Authority have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 while 5 395 await the second dose, the sub-district council chairperson, Mr Simon Ramaphoi has said.

Addressing a sub-council session on Monday, Mr Ramaphoi noted that as of mid-June, 41 teachers and 24 non-teaching staff most of whom above 54 years and in accordance with the vaccine roll-out plan, had either received the first or both doses.

Mr Ramaphoi said the numbers were expected to increase as the vaccines continued to arrive in the country. 

“I remain hopeful that the numbers will increase as the next age bracket of 34 to 54 is reached because this is where most of our workforce falls,” he said.

The chairperson further noted that in the wake of the rising COVID-19 cases country wide, the sub-district had recorded 51 deaths as at August 1, from the 6 527 cumulative positive cases.

He noted that key among challenges faced by the District Health Management Team (DHMT) was shortage of transport to monitor patients on home isolation.

He also said that shortage of health personal caused by the effects of COVID-19 had resulted in compromised care for patients.

“The district health team is facing a lot of challenges in their effort to combat this pandemic, among other things being shortage of transport to carry out COVID-19 activities such as adequate monitoring of patients on home isolation. There is also an increase in the number of staff infected or affected by COVID-19 leading to staff shortage in health facilities, as well as shortage of isolation centres leading to home care of very ill COVID-19 patients,” he said.

Consequently, Mr Ramaphoi noted that due to the increasing number of cases, plans were underway to open another isolation centre at Lotlhakane West.

He called on various organisations to devise electronic ways of proving services with minimal physical contact to reduce the spread of the disease.

Mr Ramaphoi noted that essential service providers such as Water Utilities Corporation were overwhelmed by the number of people visiting their offices daily and urged councilors to promote using other platforms of acquiring services to minimise office visits.

“COVID-19 is really causing a lot of devastation and interrupting our services. Water Utilities Corporation is not spared and is equally affected. Humans are carriers and spread the virus in various ways. The corporation is overwhelmed by frequent visits to the offices by customers which put both the customers and the employees at risk. Please, note that the corporation is advanced and has introduced several platforms to improve service provision with less customer physical interaction,” he said. ENDS