Western Cape, Cape Town launches joint strategy for Covid-19 hotspots



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By staff reporter Time of published articleMay 11, 2020

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Cape Town – The Western Cape Cabinet on Monday approved the Covid-19 Hotspot Strategy for the entire Cape Town government.

This plan sets out how the Western Cape Government will utilize and coordinate its various government departments together with Cape Town City in a unified response to Covid-19 hot spots within Cape Town City.

“The Western Cape understands that a strong and unique approach for the entire province, when some regions have few cases and others have high transmission, is neither sustainable nor effective. We need to be more flexible and innovative.”

“Therefore, we have adopted an evidence-based and data-based approach to our pandemic response, which delves below the sub-district level, to understand virus transmission within particular geographic areas,” Winde said.

What is an access point? These are areas where there are a large number of cases, and where community transmission is well established and accelerated. An access point is where people live.

This is different from a cluster. A group is where the outbreak originated, which is a hangout, such as a supermarket or retail store.

“Our response to the critical points, which involves slowing the spread of the virus and protecting vulnerable people at greatest risk, requires the combined impact of our government and the city of Cape Town to make a real difference,” Winde said.

This specific active zone plan includes the following:

  • Health response, including case management, community testing and examinations, and appropriate referral for quarantine and isolation
  • Economic response, including assistance and business mapping, ensuring social distancing in the workplace and places of economic activity, and the monitoring of our protocols developed for the workplace
  • Security response: that includes the deployment of SAPS and WCG traffic and the enforcement of Cape Town city law
  • Food security and humanitarian response: this includes our Departments of Agriculture, Social Development and relevant City initiatives
  • Places and Spaces Response, which is led by the Department of Human Settlement and its interventions in informal areas in particular
  • Transport and public response: which includes interventions regarding the movement of people and public transport, among others.

“In support of all of this, there is a new phase in the communications campaign that focuses more strongly on achieving behavior change, now that Covid-19 awareness is high. It also takes advantage of the roles of councilors, community leaders and religious organizations. ”

Full details of the plan will be released to the media and the public this week and details of when this will occur will be communicated soon, the prime minister said.

Cape Argus



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