[ad_1]
By Sihle Mlambo 
8h ago
Johannesburg – Health Minister Zweli Mkhize announced 176 more Covid-19-related deaths and 2,336 new infections on Thursday night.
This brings South Africa’s Covid-19 death toll to 14,563 and infections to more than 633,015.
South Africa has the sixth highest number of Covid-19 infections in the world, behind only the United States, Brazil, India and Russia. Peru recently overtook South Africa to become the fifth most infected country in the world.
Although the number of new infections has dropped considerably, as has the rate of testing in the last week, daily deaths are also starting to decline, although they still exceed 100 per day.
The Health Department said it had now screened more than 3.7 million people in the public and private sectors, with more than 20,000 tests performed in the last 24 hours.
The death toll from coronavirus in South Africa now stands at 14,563.
The Western Cape still has the highest number of deaths, with 3,946, Gauteng with 3,730, Eastern Cape with 2,956 and KZN, with 2,203, have the highest number of deaths in the country.
Of the last 176 deaths, Mkhize said the majority came from Gauteng, KZN, Mpumalanga and the Eastern Cape.
Deaths by province:
Gauteng – 50
KZN – 39
Mpumalanga – 27
Eastern Cape – 24
Western Cape – 17
Northwest – 9
Free State – 8
This brings the total number of Covid-19-related deaths to 14,389.
“We extend our condolences to the loved ones of the deceased and we thank the healthcare workers who treated the deceased patients.
“Our recoveries are now at 554,887, which translates to a recovery rate of 88%,” he said.
The minister also said that he told Parliament on Wednesday that the country had passed the Covid-19 storm.
Also this week, Wits University Vaccine Professor Shabir Madhi said community broadcasts were slowing down and the positivity rate had nearly halved between level 5 and level 2, passing from 27% to 15% today.
Madhi said they expected further declines in the coming weeks, but stressed that this was not the time for Covid-19 complacency.
MESS
[ad_2]
