Evidence piles up that Covid advice was ignored

Fresh evidence has emerged of how the government ignored the counsel of experts appointed to advise it on managing the coronavirus pandemic.

Earlier this week, Business Day reported that the government had overridden advice from the ministerial advisory committee on Covid-19 to scrap all testing for travellers to SA and to ditch rules on social distancing.

It now transpires that a technical working group supporting the ministerial advisory committee warned the government six weeks ago that its plan to replace the coronavirus regulations brought into effect in terms of the Disaster Management Act with regulations to the National Health Act risked legal challenge because they would potentially undermine constitutionally enshrined rights.

But the government, under growing pressure to end the national state of disaster — which was brought into effect two years ago to manage Covid19 — has pressed ahead with its plan to use National Health Act regulations to deal with Covid19 and any future health threats.

The government has proposed wide-ranging regulations dealing with the size of gatherings, social distancing, quarantine and isolation, funerals, travel in and out of SA, and the handling of corpses.

They are contained in amendments to three sets of regulations to the National Health Act and amendments to regulations to the International Health Regulations Act, published in the Government Gazette on March 15.

The working group’s advice is contained in a position paper dated February 8, released on the government’s coronavirus website on Wednesday night.

Ministerial advisory committee co-chair Koleka Mlisana said the group provided evidencebased scientific advice, but could not force the government to follow it.

“They decide whether to take our advice, tweak it, or not take it. Difficult as it is, it is something we have learnt to live with.”

Mlisana said the ministerial advisory committee had insisted its advisories were dated and urged the government to publish them timeously so the public could see the counsel that had been provided. It is up to the government to explain why it deviated from the advice.

Ministerial advisory committee advisories are typically published on the government’s coronavirus site weeks, and sometimes months, after they are submitted to health minister Joe Phaahla. These advisories inform the input he provides to the national coronavirus command council and the cabinet.

The working group advised the government to scrap an array of measures it said are ineffective at containing the spread of the virus, including temperature screening, hand sanitising and decontamination of premises. These measures are still required by law.

It also advocated dropping outdoor mask mandates and ending PCR testing for international travellers, measures that were partially scrapped this

week. Masks outdoors are no longer required, but only vaccinated travellers to SA are exempt from PCR tests, according to the latest iteration of the government’s coronavirus regulations, which came into effect on Wednesday.

The working group recommended moving from a containment to a mitigation strategy, saying it is clear the virus will not be eliminated.

“As Covid-19 continues to pose a health risk into 2022 and beyond, there is a need to consider responses that are integrated into the health system, that are not detrimental to other health needs, and which aim to minimise the extraordinary cost to the macroeconomy,” it said.

While the lockdown imposed shortly after SA’s first cases were identified in March 2020 was justified, the economic damage and large-scale job losses that ensued cannot be ignored, it said.

At this stage, the threat of a Covid-19 surge overwhelming the health service has been substantially reduced by access to vaccines, which protect against severe illness and death, and extensive prior infection.

A study led by Wits dean of health sciences Prof Shabir Madhi found more than 70% of Gauteng’s population had antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 before the onset of the fourth wave, which peaked in December.

THE WORKING GROUP ADVISED THE GOVERNMENT TO SCRAP AN ARRAY OF MEASURES IT SAID ARE INEFFECTIVE