Exciting news: we’re giving Discovery Vitality members 2 500 Vitality points for COVID-19 vaccination

I’m delighted to share the news with you that all Vitality members aged 18 or older will be awarded?2 500 Vitality points for being fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in 2021. These points will be awarded retrospectively in October for those who have already been vaccinated. If members have already been vaccinated, there is nothing more they need to do – points will be automatically allocated before the end of the year.

I want to share our reason for this. The allocation of Vitality points is used to incentivise members for positive behaviour change. It is also in line with Discovery’s shared-value business model. Vitality creates shared value by combining behavioural economics, clinical science, and incentives to encourage and reward members for taking steps to improve their health.

There is overwhelming proof that vaccination is the single most important thing we can do to protect ourselves and others against COVID-19. The pandemic has been devastating and a fourth wave is likely, but the good news is that the ability to suppress it remains within our control.?

Based on our actuarial projections, over 30 000 lives could be saved if we are able to vaccinate the majority of our population over the coming months. The data reflects the power of vaccination to save lives and reduce our healthcare burden: vaccination reduces infection and transmission risk by 50 to 80%, reduces hospitalisation risk by 60 to 90%, and reduces risk of death by over 90%. In fact, while your (unvaccinated) risk of death from COVID-19 is 8 to 10 times higher than death from flu, once vaccinated, your risk of death from COVID-19 is lower than from flu.?

Given that vaccination is our best hope of beating the pandemic and restoring our national vitality and way of life, we need to encourage vaccination at scale.

Discovery is committed to playing its part to support South Africa’s national vaccination rollout, and doing everything we can to ensure that the majority of adult South Africans are vaccinated ahead of a fourth wave. In addition to sharing information (visit our COVID-19 vaccine information hub), we’ve helped to vaccinate over 500 000 individuals at our vaccination sites across South Africa; and last week, Discovery CEO Adrian Gore announced the intention to mandate vaccination for Discovery employees from January 2022.

The allocation of Vitality points is one more contribution to helping get all South Africans vaccinated.

We’ll share further details with our members soon.

#IGotMyVaccine?at a Discovery site. Book today:?discv.co/BookNow