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By IOL Reporter 
8h ago
Cape Town – South Africa has recorded 115 more Covid-19-related deaths, bringing the total number of deaths to 13,743 on Friday.
A total of 47 people died in Gauteng, 14 in KwaZulu-Natal, 10 in the Eastern Cape, 10 in the Western Cape, 16 in the Northwest and 18 in Mpumalanga, Health Minister Zweli Mkhize said in a statement.
” To date, a cumulative total of 620 132 confirmed cases of Covid-19 have been registered in South Africa.
“Our recoveries now stand at 533,935, which translates into a recovery rate of 86%.
“The total number of tests performed to date is 3,632,311, with 14,329 new tests performed since the last report.”
Meanwhile, the Covid-19 ministerial advisory committee (MAC) warned against the use of disinfectant tunnels as a preventive measure against Covid-19, a warning statement from Mkhize showed.
The MAC believes that spraying individuals with chemicals could have physical and psychological effects. Chemicals used in sanitizing tunnels could, for example, damage or alter the body’s natural bacteria that protect against disease.
Sanitizing tunnels were installed in shopping malls, schools and taxi stands when the coronavirus first hit SA.
Professor Salim Abdool Karim, chairman of SA’s ministerial advisory committee on Covid-19, had warned at the time that there was no scientific evidence to support claims that disinfectant tunnels could prevent the spread of Covid-19.
The World Health Organization and the African Infection Control Network, among others, do not support the exposure of humans to chemical aerosols.
The MAC also estimated that the proportion of asymptomatic infected individuals in SA ranges from 50 to 80%, saying the reasons were not clearly understood.
Karim said that asymptomatic infection may be more common in children under the age of 18 than in adults.
“The SARS-CoV-2 viral load in asymptomatic infected people is slightly lower than in symptomatic Covid-19 cases …
“Asymptomatic people with SARS-COV-2 can transmit the virus, although they are probably slightly less infectious than symptomatic people,” Karim said.
A meter or two? Or is it six? When it comes to coronavirus social distancing, there is no general rule of thumb, researchers warned this week in another study.
Interior or exterior; the speed and pattern of air flows; if one is whispering, yelling or sneezing; air conditioning or open windows; duration of exposure; If one is wearing a mask, all of these elements will determine how far one is far enough when it comes to avoiding Covid-19 infection.
“The rigid safe distancing rules are an oversimplification based on outdated science and past virus experiences,” said lead author Nicholas Jones, a researcher at Saint Thomas Hospital in London.
meOL
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