A man is seen at the Ramotswa border, a border post for Botswana to or from South Africa that was closed in March 2020 in an effort to curb the spread of Covid-19. (Xinhua)
Johannesburg - Eighty more people have succumbed to the coronavirus in South Africa, the Department of Health said on Wednesday.
This comes as 591 people in the country were confirmed to be newly infected with the virus.
The latest deaths take South Africa's death toll due to the coronavirus pandemic to 88 754 since last year.
This as the latest confirmed infections take the number of confirmed Covid-19 infections in the country to over 2.9 million since the first case was detected in March last year.
National Institute for Communicable Diseases spokesperson Sinenhlanhla Jimoh said the majority of the new infections came from KZN, the Western Cape and jointly the Free State and Gauteng.
PROVINCIAL BREAKDOWN
KZN - 22%
Western Cape - 21%
Gauteng, Free State - 12%
Eastern Cape, North West, Northern Cape - 9%
Mpumalanga - 5%
Limpopo - 1%
The majority of new cases came from KwaZulu-Natal (22%), followed by the Western Cape (21%). The Free State and Gauteng each accounted for 12%; the Eastern Cape, North West and Northern Cape each accounted for 9%; Mpumalanga for 5% and Limpopo for 1% of the new cases, said Jimoh.
Jimoh said 18 million Covid-19 tests had been conducted in the public and private sector since last year, with just over 34 500 tests conducted in the past 24 hours..
She added: “Today the institute reports 591 new Covid-19 cases that have been identified in South Africa, which brings the total number of laboratory-confirmed cases to 2 917 846.
“This increase represents a 1.7% positivity rate.
“As per the National Department of Health, a further 80 Covid-19 related deaths have been reported, bringing the total fatalities to 88 754 to date.”
Jimoh added that 46 people were admitted in hospital due to Covid-19 in the past 24 hours, taking the total number of people hospitalised on account of the virus to 4 777.
Meanwhile, over 201 000 jabs were administered against the virus in the past 24 hours, the Department of Health said, taking total vaccination jabs to over 20.7 million.
The Department of Health said 118 000 people had taken their first jabs in the past 24 hours.
IOL