There is a simple way of overcoming vaccine hesitancy – incentivise hesitant people by offering rewards via lotteries.

Every person who gets vaccinated against Covid-19 would have his or her name automatically entered into a lottery that is run each week. First prize each week R500 000, second prize R400 000, third R300 000, fourth R200 000, and fifth R100 000.

There would be a single national lottery. Government co-operation would be necessary, obviously, but the lotteries would be financed and operated by the private sector.

Large companies reluctant to make vaccination compulsory could run in-house lotteries.

The system would come to an end once 80% (say) of people have been vaccinated. If prize winners sometimes turn out to be people with principled objections to lotteries, their winnings would go to the next person on the list.   

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John Kane-Berman, a graduate of Wits and Oxford (where he was a Rhodes Scholar), is a former CEO of the IRR. Prior to that he spent ten years in journalism, where he was senior assistant editor of the Financial Mail and South African correspondent for numerous foreign papers. He is the author of several books on South African politics, and has also published his memoirs.