By Jacqueline Mackenzie
(Bloomberg) – South Africa’s National Treasury is considering raising taxes as one of several possible mechanisms to fund the vaccination drive against Covid-19, Business Day reported.
At this point South Africa is due to get 9 million doses from Johnson & Johnson, 1.5 million shots of the AstraZeneca vaccine, 12 million through Covax and 12.25 million from the African Vaccine Acquisition Task Team, according to the daily newspaper.
Read also: Covid-19: AU secures vaccines for 1 in 4 Africans
The government viewed the vaccines as a public good and was committed to financing their roll out, with or without support from the private sector and medical schemes, the Johannesburg-based newspaper reported, citing Treasury Director-General Dondo Mogajane.
Read also: SA Medical Aids to pay for 14 million Covid-19 vaccines
Other options the Treasury is exploring include widening the budget deficit and re-prioritising government spending. The pandemic was a good case for emergency funding, Business Day cited Mogajane as saying.
The department of health has estimated a maximum cost of R20bn ($1.3bn) to vaccinate the entire country, while more recent internal estimates done by the Treasury are far lower than this, the newspaper said.
The DA strongly opposes the tax hikes mooted by Treasury Director-General, Dondo Mogajane, to pay for the Covid vaccine programme.
Higher taxes would be a slap in the face of hard-working South Africans. – @geordinhl https://t.co/qfQAFAAUSy
— Democratic Alliance (@Our_DA) January 18, 2021
