Umm Muhammed Umar

This week could possibly see President Cyril Ramaphosa’s last family meeting. South Africa has now been in the state of disaster, at different levels of lockdown, for two years since it was first declared at the end of March 2020. Labour lawyer, Tony Healy, and Professor Alex Welter from the South African Centre for Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis discussed with Radio Islam what life would look like once these restrictions were totally lifted.

The National Coronavirus Command Council was to meet today. The President’s SONA appeared to indicate that government wanted to scrap the state of disaster all together. On the other hand, there has been speculation that government is not ready to do so, and has to put in place some alternative measures to ensure that things don’t spiral out of control.

Professor Welter said that now was the time to ‘make hay while the sun shines’, seeing that infection rates, at about 1000 cases on average per day were relatively low. He added that a very large number of people enjoy immunity either via vaccination or from previous infection. He said, “And we don’t expect, unless there’s a brand-new variant, a major new way over the next couple of weeks.” Healy, meanwhile, said that there was no legal impediment to the state of disaster being withdrawn, nor any significant legal implications.

There were certain that if the state of disaster were removed altogether, as South Africa moved into winter, if another wave appeared, it would be very difficult to reintroduce the transmission – curbing measures. Further, there were also fears that the vaccination program may suffer because people might not find vaccinating necessary, once the restrictions were removed. Professor Welter said, “a lot of people felt throughout the major heavy lockdowns, that a lot of things were done in a sort of a panic stricken, overzealous kind of way.” He added, “we moved away very rapidly from useful information – “We encourage you; we support you to do the right thing to protect yourself, protect those around you” – to “here’s what you have to do. Here’s what you may do.” He said that now was a good time to start unpacking good information, and good support measures. Prof Welter added that even the fact that the NCCC was called a Command Council was militaristic. He said, “We’re not at war; we have a crisis which now is evolving and (to) which we need to take cleverer approaches, not, sort of, hard and fast simple ‘here the rules’ kind of approach.”

Many companies have instructed employees to return, if not every day, then on a rotational basis, with some still waiting to see what the President says. Healy said that an employee could refuse to return for a valid reason relating to the workplace being unsafe or unhealthy. However, he added that that was 99% of the time not a valid argument. So, while employees are, generally, resisting returning to work, if they’re instructed to return to work, they have a duty to do, or face negative consequences if they don’t.

Leading experts such as Professors Salim Abdul Karim and, and Shabbir Madhi have said that most people have not been using the right type of mask, and hand washing and sanitizing hasn’t really played the part that was hoped for. Professor Welter said that not everybody could afford an N95 mask, which really made a big difference.  He said, “so I’m of the view, as I think increasingly many people are, this is a waste of time and a waste of money, and in most cases, even if hand sanitizer, in principle, could make a big difference……. I would move to really, again reminding people how to wash your hands properly, when to wash your hands; these are good habits. He added, “but you know, we don’t have to put some product, some slightly more expensive product on our hand. We don’t have to take temperatures before entering the gym every time, and I think there’s a lot of excessive stuff.” He said that instead, while good masks were currently not as critical as they would be when the next wave arrived, the focus should be on how to make them available. Professor Welter reiterated that overcrowded spaces, quite obviously, should be avoided. Large gatherings, such large weddings or raves, have proved to have been super spreaders.  However, he added that only a small number of acts of overconcentration should be subject to regulation, with people allowed to earn their livelihoods.

In so far as the vaccine was concerned, Healy said that a distinction needed to be drawn between society at large and workplaces as separate entities. He said, “in circumstances where, after the employers conducted an assessment of the workplace and concluded that they are not able to apply all the necessary social distancing and other protocols related to being able to avoid infection and transmission, then they are allowed to introduce a mandate for your workplace vaccination policy.” He added, however, that there was a raging question in the public eye at the moment as to human rights and a right to physical integrity, “and then you’ve got to kind of weigh that up against the rights of others”. He said, “there are so many different highly emotionally charged views on the subject, and massive polarization when it comes to workplace vaccination.”