The Kenya Red Cross van drives down the half-empty Sunday street of Mombasa's waterfront. On the roof a megaphone repeats in loop the message in Kiswahili: "Today is a special day of vaccinations in the park. There are two vaccination points, feel free to go there. It's completely free and you won't have any problems. Please note that with without the double vaccine you will not be able to access public offices, railroad and other services."
There is no line, but a few adults stand in line. The kids pass by indifferently and sit on the benches overlooking the Indian Ocean, buy an ice cream from the Creambell carts and obviously throw the carton on the ground, which goes to keep company with bags of chips, plastic cups and other junk that adorn the park studded with ancient baobab trees, used as latrines. They are the block that does not raise the percentages: the generational indifference and living for the day typical of these areas, is added to the lack of trust in government and the tendency to feel a bit 'rebellious, in refusing something that is not mandatory.
This should be the squeeze on vaccines announced by the government a few days ago. It is possible that elsewhere in the country is working, certainly not on the coast. The goal would be to soon exceed 20 million vaccinated (10 million vaccinated in 10 days, is the slogan).
From local media inquiries, nearly 10 million doses from AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna are languishing in the Ministry of Health warehouses. Many of these have approaching deadlines.
The latest arrivals are dated late November and the government has guaranteed that it would not import vaccines with expiry dates of less than 90 days. In a few days, according to agreements already made with the African Union, another 4 million should arrive, bringing the total number of doses received to 28 and a half million, of which less than half have been administered.
The first doses are almost seven million, less than six and a half people are fully vaccinated and since the beginning of the year there are 200 thousand citizens who have requested and received the booster.
The Minister of Health Mutahi Kagwe before last Christmas has also opened to vaccinations for children under 18 and over 15, even considering that private schools would not accept pupils without at least one vaccine and the appointment for the second. About 300,000 responded, more or less those who were obliged to do so. Better responded the elderly, data from the Ministry show that in the last two months the number of people over 58 years fully vaccinated has doubled, from 20 to 40%.
"If we don't think of effective ways to accelerate the vaccination process and act quickly," Kagwe warned, "we risk seeing wasted the enormous public resources and those of our development partners that have been spent to secure vaccines. Even with the best storage facilities, these vaccines have a shelf life beyond which their expiration and disposal will be inevitable. A highly unconscionable occurrence considering the large number of unvaccinated Kenyans who need them."
The African Union has already raised the African issue at an international level: vaccines donated to countries on the continent have a short shelf life and many nations have already had to throw away vaccines, despite the fact that on average Africa has vaccinated 10% of its 1.3 billion inhabitants.
The Kenyan ministry has so far installed freezers to strengthen the country's cold chain system to ensure the delivery of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, trained and equipped over 8,000 health workers and opened over 3,000 vaccination posts across the country.
The plan, which is frankly not easy to achieve, is to fully vaccinate at least 19 million Kenyans by the end of June and the entire adult population, estimated at about 27.5 million, by the end of 2022.