No basis to keep SA on Red List

Last week, Vaccinologist, Dr Shabir Madhi said there was no scientific basis for the United Kingdom’s decision to keep South Africa on its Red List for travel.

Britain published its updated list two weeks ago, with South Africa still listed under red. Eight countries were removed from the list, including Kenya and Egypt.

The UK said as of October the new rules did not yet recognize South Africa’s vaccination programme, meaning local travellers would still be subject to tight restrictions.

According to Madhi, experts found this difficult to understand as the standards of locally-used vaccines were not inferior to vaccines in other parts of the world.

“It is more irrational than anything else and there is no scientific basis for this decision to be made. The vaccines that are being used in SA are not inferior to those being used in the UK or anywhere else in the world. SA has the Delta variant that is dominating, but SA has more people vaccinated than places such as Kenya and Pakistan for example, which have been removed from the Red List. So it is difficult to comprehend the basis on which this decision has been made” says Madhi.

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