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Bongani Ndlovu, Online Reporter

RESIDENTS’ associations in Bulawayo have urged the Government to decongest vaccination centres by setting up others, so as to limit the risk of the spread of Covid-19.

Zimbabwe is on a massive vaccination drive meant to help the country to attain herd immunity as quick as possible. As of Wednesday, 30 657 people have been vaccinated bringing the cumulative for the first dose to 1 522 150 while 7 469 received the second dose bringing the cumulative for the second dose to 694 685.

In Bulawayo, more than 100 000 people have been vaccinated, as the province drives to attain herd immunity of 400 000 people being fully vaccinated.

Since the Government started vaccination, there has been an upsurge in the public flocking inoculation centres in Bulawayo.

There are 30 vaccination centres in Bulawayo which have seen long queues and residents’ associations are afraid that these could lead to people being infected by the deadly virus.

According to the residents’ associations, most of those who are getting vaccinated are for the first jab of either Sinovac or Sinopharm and from their observations, the high-density suburbs have a high number of people seeking inoculation.

Bulawayo United Residents Association (BURA) chairman, Winos Dube said although the response has been high, they are concerned that vaccination queues could be Covid-19 spreaders.

“We’ve been encouraging residents to get vaccinated, after it was opened for all. People are really itching for it. And we want to appeal to authorities if they could open more vaccination centres to be close to people to avoid that crowding during vaccination. This is so that people don’t travel away from wherever they are, because the queue in a certain place is shorter than the one that is nearest to them,” said Mr Dube.

He said for instance, in his area, Ward 25, there is one clinic servicing more than five high density suburbs and urged the Government to utilise surgeries in these areas.

“Take for instance my place, Ward 25, vaccination is at Nketa Clinic. You can imagine the volume of people that it services, such as Emganwini, Nketa 7, 6, 9 and part of Nkulumane flocks to this clinic.

“There are surgeries in Nketa 6 and Nketa 7 that could be utilised for the purposes of vaccination and thereby decongesting. We’ve so many doctors that are running surgeries within our high-density suburbs. We’ve been thinking as lay people, that the Government could utilise these to provide vaccination for the people. This is because these surgeries are close to the people and there are many,” said Mr Dube.

He said residents were responding positively to the vaccination programme.

Bulawayo Progressive Residents Association (BPRA) chairman, Mr Ambrose Sibindi said from observations made by them, the congestion at the queues could lead to the spread of the virus.

“The situation at the queues is challenging and unbearable. We aren’t blaming the workers, because the system is overwhelmed. This is because of numbers. A lot of people are testing positive and dying, so many people are opting to get vaccinated to keep themselves safe.

“These days when people get there especially at clinics and hospitals, there are queues already and, in most times, social distancing won’t be maintained. There is a danger that in these queues people can infect each other and spread the virus. Before, people would be told to leave, but now they are being told that everyone in the queue will be attended to. This is where we are worried, as the time that people spend in these queues waiting to be vaccinated is too long,” said Mr Sibindi.

He said as BPRA they observed that most of the people were getting the first dose of the vaccine and the most congestion in queues was in the high-density areas.

“Generally, we tried to assess all the clinics and hospitals. We have been to Mpilo, UBH and Ingutsheni and they are issuing the second dose of the vaccine. This has reduced the numbers of people there. However, in the high-density suburbs, where the first dose is being mostly administered, we’ve a challenge, the congestion is very heavy. There are some suburbs that don’t have clinics and other people travel to others to get the vaccine,” said Mr Sibindi.

He suggested that each health centre take up people in batches to decongest them.

“However, our take is since there are so many people wanting to be vaccinated, why not give them cards and they get the jab in batches. Maybe if we want to vaccinate 500 people a day (per health centre), those 500 are given a day to come, perhaps the first on a Monday and so on and so on to avoid congestion,” said Mr Sibindi.

 

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