Johannesburg - Health Minister Zweli Mkhize has announced 286 more Covid-19 related deaths and 6275 new infections on Thursday night.
This takes South Africa’s Covid-19 death toll to 11 556, and infections, to over 579 140. South Africa has the fifth most Covid-19 infections in the world, behind only USA, Brazil, India and Russia.
Although the number of new infections has slowed in South Africa, as has the rate of testing in the past week, daily deaths remain high.
In the past four days, 935 people have died in Covid-19 related deaths. On Tuesday, 130 people were announced to have died, another 259 on Wednesday, 260 more on Thursday night and 286 were announced on Friday’s daily update.
The Department of Health said it had now tested over 3.3 million people in the private and public sector, with over 35 000 tests conducted in the past 24 hours.
South Africa’s coronavirus death toll now stands at 11 556.
The Western Cape still has the most deaths, with 3534, Gauteng with 2867, Eastern Cape with 2442 and KZN, with 1617, have the most fatalities in the country.
Of the latest 286 deaths, Mkhize said the most deaths came from the Gauteng and KZN provinces.
Gauteng - 76
KZN - 54
Eastern Cape - 42
North West - 26
Western Cape - 28
Free State - 20
Northern Cape - 18
“This brings the cumulative total of reported Covid-19 related deaths to 11 556,” said the minister.
“We convey our condolences to the loved ones of the departed and thank the health care workers who treated the deceased.
“The number of recoveries currently stands at 461 734 which translates to a recovery rate of 79%,” said Mkhize.
This means almost 8 people out of every 10 who had Covid-19 since it first arrived in the country in March, have survived the virus.
IOL