To further lower the risk of group employees contracting COVID-19, as the third wave of COVID-19 started to take hold this year ACTOM got in touch with the Reality Wellness Group, which offers a range of wellness interventions and activities to corporates, to provide on-site vaccinations to employees.
It was agreed that Reality would first run information sessions for the employees to inform them fully about what the vaccinations are about to help to ensure they understood clearly that vaccinations are completely safe and effective in preventing contracting the disease. 
The provision of on-site vaccinations by Reality was however conditional upon each site arranging to have at least 100 employees in attendance to be vaccinated on a given day.
“Due to this condition, we were unable to arrange to have on-site vaccinations provided at all the group’s business sites. The site at Knights, Germiston, could guarantee attendance of the required minimum number of employees, while some of the other sites made alternative arrangements to have their employees vaccinated,” said Alre van Wyk, ACTOM’s Group Environmental, Health & Safety Officer.
He went on to point out that many employees were found to be resistant to being vaccinated, due to being misinformed about its effects.
“As you surely know already, many untrue horror stories have circulated throughout the population, and indeed worldwide, about vaccinations being harmful in some way. In fact, an extraordinary number of people have seriously adopted the false idea, which has been spread widely via social media and by word-of-mouth, that COVID-19 itself isn’t a life-threatening disease at all, but just another form of flu! So it’s hardly surprising that many of our employees have taken such misinformation to heart,” he said.
A month-long strike by workers at ACTOM’s main site at Knights that occurred immediately prior to the widespread strike in October also contributed strongly to the poor attendance on “vaccination day” at Knights.
Consequently, at the Knights site, where 1500 people work, the number of employees who attended the on-site vaccinations session on the appointed day, September 9, was disappointingly small – a total of only 120 people.
Marthinusen & Coutts (M&C) arranged for vaccinations to be provided off-site at a facility in Fourways for employees from its Cleveland and Benoni workshops on a number of days in August and provided transport for them to get there and back on each occasion.
M&C made a special arrangement with Reality to provide on-site vaccinations at its Rustenburg branch, where 33 employees were vaccinated with the Pfizer first jab on September 13 and the second jab on October 29.
On-site vaccinations by Reality of most of the employees at LH Marthinusen’s Denver, Johannesburg, site were carried out during August, September and October, with 288 employees, or 88 % of the total, being vaccinated during that time.
“These vaccination sessions included repeat visits for the second Pfizer dose by people who’d had the first dose during one of the earlier sessions,” said George McKeever, LHM’s Divisional SHEQ Manager.
John Thompson ran a full-on promotional campaign towards the end of the year at its head office and factory premises in Bellville, Cape Town, to encourage employees to get vaccinated, including producing and displaying posters inviting them to attend on-site vaccinations that Department of Health nurses came there to provide on September 22 and November 4.
The majority of the vaccinations, however, were arranged off-site during this period, with about 250 staff-members being vaccinated on that basis, while 45 employees received their first and second Pfizer jabs at the two abovementioned on-site sessions.
“Continuous information sessions, posters and talks were run via our John Thompson communications e-mails, assisted by Reality Wellness, line management, toolbox talks and one-on-one talks,” said Riaan Louw, John Thompson’s Risk Manager.
