Cape Town - South Africa’s confirmed Covid-19 cases now stand at 583 653, of which 105 000 are active cases. A total of 11 660 people have died from the virus since the first cases was recorded on March 5, President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Saturday.
South Africa has recorded a recovery rate of 80 percent.
Over the past three weeks the number of patients who have been hospitalised due to the disease has declined dramatically, Ramaphosa said.
The president made the announcement during and address to the nation to provide an update on the country’s risk-adjusted strategy to manage the pandemic.
South Africa will move to level 2 lockdown from Monday, which will see restrictions on activities and movement eased further.
Ramaphosa had been under pressure to move the country to level 2 to allow for the opening up of the economy which has been virtually crippled by the impact of the hard lockdown.
Of the 121 new deaths reported on Saturday, the Department of Health said most came from KwaZulu-Natal, where 34 new deaths were noted.
Gauteng - 21
Limpopo - 18
Eastern Cape - 5
Western Cape - 26
Free State - 17
Black South Africans dying at a a higher rate from Covid-19
The latest data released by the National Institute for Communicable Diseases shows that black and coloured people account for the majority of Covid-19 deaths reported since the beginning of the outbreak in South Africa.
“In addition to factors previously reported to be associated with in-hospital mortality (older age groups; male sex; admission in the public sector; month of admissions; and having comorbid hypertension, diabetes, chronic cardiac disease, chronic renal disease, malignancy, HIV, current tuberculosis alone or both current and past tuberculosis, and obesity), individuals of Black African and Coloured race were more likely to die in-hospital as compared to Whites,” the NICD said.
IOL