South Africa Was the First to Report the Omicron Variant to WHO
We are reviewing a Facebook post, which insinuates that the fact that the Republic of South Africa asked vaccine manufacturers Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson not to deliver further doses in that country, is the reason why the omicron variant has appeared, for which there are indications that is more contagious, and it is not yet known whether it causes a more severe clinical picture in patients who have been infected.
South Africa. Post from 24 November 2021. They request stopping the delivery from Pfizer and Johnson. Then, the miraculous appearance of Omicron follows. An occasion for starting a war. Psychological-terrorist propaganda played at its strongest. Everything is not going according to plan, because they thought we were retarded, but we are not, reads the post we are reviewing.
However, South Africa did not ask vaccine manufacturers to stop delivering vaccines, but to delay delivery. The reason is that in this country there is a sufficient number of vaccines in stock, which are not used. In South Africa, only 35 percent of the population is fully vaccinated, a higher rate than most African countries, but half of the target set by the government by the end of the year. There is another month until the end of the year, and there are vaccines too. Therefore, it is requested not to send more doses from the manufacturers until the ones in stock have been administered.
We have 158 days’ stock in the country at current use. We have deferred some deliveries, a spokesman for the health ministry told Reuters, without specifying when future deliveries would take place.
Stavros Nicolaou, chief executive of Aspen Pharmacare, which is packaging 25 million doses a month of J&J vaccines in South Africa, said most of the vaccines bound for South Africa would now go to the rest of the continent.
A Pfizer spokesman said:
We remain adaptable to individual country’s vaccine requirements whilst continuing to meet our quarterly commitments as per the South Africa supply agreement.
It is completely incorrect to suggest that the pharmaceutical companies Pfizer or Johnson & Johnson have anything to do with the Omicron variant and that the variant appeared because South Africa requested that no more doses be sent from the manufacturers to this country until the old ones run out.
Why?
Because the omicron variant was detected not by Pfizer, not by Johnson & Johnson, not by a Western European or American country, but by South Africa itself!
South Africa is the first country in the world to inform the World Health Organization about the emergence of a new, specific variant whose spike protein mutation is more than 30 times greater, and patients infected with omicron first appeared in early November in a doctor’s office from South Africa with unusual symptoms, among which, the most dominant were extreme fatigue, headache and body aches.
The President of the Republic of South Africa, Cyril Ramafoza, expressed his deep disappointment because many countries of the world closed the air traffic to South Africa or began to impose restrictions, isolating this country as a preventive measure against the unknown, i.e. the omicron variant.
The WHO itself writes on its official website that South Africa reported the omicron variant of the Coronavirus on 24 November 2021. Thus, it is impossible for any Western power, i.e. pharmaceutical companies, to be responsible for its occurrence as a response or attack, because South Africa has delayed the procurement of Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson vaccines as falsely claimed in the post we are reviewing.
Given all of the above, we assess the post as untrue.
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