Conspiracy theories surround Covid-19 vaccines

By Kundai Marunya

There is a lot of skepticism in a significant population of the world regarding Covid-19 vaccines, with a lot of conspiracy theories doing rounds on social media.
This comes as the Government of Zimbabwe itself has set the stage for the conspiracies after Vice President Constantino Chiwenga, who is also Minister of Health and Child Care recently said “Government will ascertain safety of vaccines first”.
Popular cleric Emmanuel Makandiwa was recently in the eye of a storm after expressing doubts about the genuineness of vaccines being manufactured around the world.
Zimbabwe is making arrangements to procure the vaccine through the COVAX facility, or from China and Russia while the United Kingdom has promised to help inoculate a percentage of the population.
Government is targeting to vaccinate at least 11 million people to achieve herd immunity.
China, which developed its own vaccine, listed Zimbabwe as one of the countries it intends to assist with vaccination.
In recent reports Health and Child Care Principal Director, Policy Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Dr Robert Mudyiradima, who is in charge of the vaccination programme said Government had already agreed to take the vaccine and all the necessary resources have been made available.
“We are in negotiations with China, Russia and the WHO so that we get the vaccine. As Government we have already decided to take the vaccine and it’s not a matter of if, but when and which one we are going to use.
“We need to vaccinate at least 80 percent of the population initially. We will however, eventually vaccinate everyone. We have been informed by the financier that all the resources we need are available,” he said.
The British government has already offered vaccination for 20 percent of the Zimbabwean population. Zimbabwe is also reported to be getting three million doses of vaccines at a cost of US$25 million from the 270 million jabs availed to the African Union.
The vaccines will cover 15 percent of Zimbabwe’s population.
The vaccines are being sourced by the Africa Vaccine Acquisition Task Force set up by African Union Chair and South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa.
Numbers of new infections in Zimbabwe have skyrocketed to reach over 1000 in 24 hours while mortality has reached 47 in a single day.
The vaccine is, however, viewed with skepticism and suspicion as conspiracy theorists have taken to both social and mainstream media to air dangerous sentiments that have seen a huge debate over the safety of vaccines.
Some members of the public, church leaders included, seem to believe in the conspiracy that a world telecoms billionaire is using the vaccine to implant microchips to monitor the movement of billions of people.
Others also believe that the vaccine is targeting to eliminate black people. They are even calling on African presidents and the population at large to refuse to take the vaccine.
The reports have been dismissed as “bad combination of pandemic and social media”.
“I encourage people not to take that vaccine as it bears the 666 mark of the beast (Satan). It’s not worth taking it if in the end you will lose your soul and a chance to dine with God in heaven,” said a Prophet Muguti in an audio preaching that has since gone viral on social media.
Some conspiracy theorists have gone on to suggest that the vaccine causes impotency to black people.
Though some of the theories have been beyond outrageous, people have been dying after taking the vaccine. Some people died as the result of the side effects after taking the vaccine, with the most recent cases being recorded in Norway were 23 elderly people died last week.
In some European countries and the United States some people who took the vaccine are reported to have contracted the virus.
This has brought forth the question of whether the vaccine is effective and if it has long-term harmful side effects to people’s health.
To further fuel skepticism were recent utterances by the Minister of Defence Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri when she was ambushed by a journalist who tricked her into thinking he was her relative.
In the recorded telephone interview, Muchinguri-Kashiri is reported to have said: “I will never take the vaccine. I will not take ‘your’ vaccine, I will not take your vaccine unless if it’s developed by our own people, Zimbabweans.
“If they develop our own vaccine. Why can’t we also develop our own vaccine. Why should we take that which is developed by others? Why can’t we also make our own vaccine? Let’s develop our own.
“We are trying our own, we are also trying our own that which we are developing with the help of the Chinese maybe it will be successful maybe it will be successful. I do not know.”
Locals have however taken a liking to home-grown remedies, which are not scientifically proven to cure the virus. Nhau/Indaba