Government knew about AstraZeneca’s expiry date – Mkhize

Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize has said that as government, they knew that the AstraZeneca vaccines for COVID-19, had a limited shelf life and were only good until April 2021, when they secured the drug.

Mkhize held a public briefing on government’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout plan on Wednesday, 10 February 2021.

South Africans were up in arms after learning that, among other things, the shipment of 1.5 million AstraZeneca vaccine doses, would be expiring in April 2021. As if that wasn’t enough, a study found that the jabs would have essentially been ineffective against the new variant of COVID-19.

This prompted government to halt the rollout of the AstraZeneca vaccine, while scientists chart a way forward.

In terms of the expiry dates of the vaccines, Mkhize said this would not have been a train smash as the healthcare workers, who are first in line to be vaccinated, would have receive the jabs before April.

“If we had proceeded with the AstraZeneca rollout, these doses would have been finished by the expiry date. In other words, the expiry date would not have been a factor at all because we would have started with the vaccination and were targeted at finishing long before that date,”

Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize

Mkhize: None of the AstraZeneca vaccines have expired

There were also concerns that the AstraZeneca vaccines had already been expired and that government would actually give the doses to people, which Mkhize clarified, saying that was not the case.

“The vaccines have not expired, I think it’s important to underline that because when the issue of expiry is being raised, some people think it’s already expired and would have been administered to people when it has expired…that’s not the case,” he said.

Mkhize further pointed out that the April expiry date for the AstraZeneca vaccine was not discovered by accident, saying it was through the quality assurance and control protocols.

“When it comes out to the public, it creates the impression that someone came across something that the department was completely unaware of and checking the expiry date is one of the basic administrative things that you do when you manage medical products,” he said.