South Africa badly affected with its new variant has decided to vaccinate several thousand people with AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccine to assess whether it protects against severe cases of a virus variant that emerged in the country, as suggested by the health experts. South Africa decided to delay the start of a much-anticipated vaccination campaign which was expected to begin this week with the first batch of one million AstraZeneca/Oxford doses. 

Last Sunday an announcement was made about the temporary suspension as a study result shows Astrazeneca jabs failed to prevent mild and moderate infection from the South African variant. Top government advisor and leading epidemiologist Salim Abdool Karim said his team had suggested limited usage of the vaccine, "We would (first) vaccinate about 100,000 people or so to monitor hospitalisation (rates)," Karim told AFP on Monday, adding that the process would take "a few weeks". 

"While we are rolling out the vaccine and collecting that information... we will be able to assess whether to continue", he added. He explained that the information will help scientists to decide whether the vaccine could still prevent severe disease, hospitalisation and death. Karim assured temporary suspension of Astrazeneca vaccine would be "partially compensated" by another batch of vaccines developed by US drugmaker Johnson & Johnson expected to land next week. South Africa's Health Minister Zweli Mkhize also conformed the same to the local media. 

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