Cape Town - The Western Cape Health Department has officially confirmed there is a Covid-19 resurgence in the province, however, it has not yet indicated the arrival of a third wave.
The province’s head of health, Dr Keith Cloete said there is a pattern that the resurgence is linked to a relaxation of behaviour.
Speaking during Premier Alan Winde’s regular online news conference, Cloete said there has been a 39% week on week increase, which could be the start of a third wave.
“We anticipate that the third wave will be lower than the second wave. However, it's dependent on the strength of our behaviour over the coming weeks. At the moment, the reproductive number is 1.2 which means cases are increasing. That's why we've gone into a resurgence,” he said.
The National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) said in a press release that while there have been sustained increases across South Africa the country has not met the threshold for a new wave.
Nationally, the seven-day moving average of confirmed cases showed an overall 46% new case increase in comparison to the previous reporting week, which is a cause for concern according to the NICD.
At a provincial level, the Free State province is currently experiencing a third wave.
Cloete said most of the sub-districts in the metro have seen an increase in cases, in particular, the Northern, Eastern and Western districts. The Cape Winelands, Garden Route and the West Coast have also had an increase in cases.
“It's a big race against time. We need to get people registered and vaccinated so that we can manage the curve. We are in between a second and a third wave.
The Western Cape is set to begin phase two of the vaccine roll-out on Monday and will be administering the Pfizer vaccine to those over 60 years who have registered on the Electronic Vaccination Data System (EVDS).
Dr Keith Cloete, or Head of the Department of Health in the Western Cape, has started his weekly digicon ➡️ https://t.co/3DnBXhWMdZ pic.twitter.com/Ef3R42MU9K
— Premier Alan Winde (@alanwinde) May 13, 2021