Zimbabwe govt moves to digitalize vaccination programme

Government has moved to digitalize the Covid-19 vaccination programme in an effort to combat fraud and corruption which is reportedly marring the vaccination programme across the country.  

Director of Health Informatics in the Ministry of Health and Child Care, Dr Simukai Zizhou told TellZim News that the Ministry of Health and Child Care is currently working on fully digitalizing the vaccination programme.

"The Ministry of Health and Child Care has designed a new proof of vaccination card that has a barcode as a security feature," said Dr Zizhemu.

He also said that those who were vaccinated before the introduction of the barcode security feature can go back to their vaccination centers for card replacement.

"People who were vaccinated during the early days of the programme should revisit their vaccination centers and get their cards replaced with new cards that have security features that cannot be forged," said Dr Zizhemu.

He also shed light on the issue of card replacement in instances when the card gets lost or stolen.

"If one loses or misplaces his or her vaccination card, they can visit their vaccination center and get a new card with all their details," said Dr Zizhemu.

This comes at a time when a couple of health officials were arrested for engaging in underhand vaccination deals while some have been arraigned before the courts for passing out vaccination cards to unvaccinated people.