Johannesburg - With South Africa going through the Covid-19 second wave, businesses such as restaurants and bars have been advised to ensure that their establishments don’t host super-spreader events.
On Wednesday, Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize announced that the country was going through a second wave with more 6 000 new cases being recorded daily.
He said they were seeing a spike in cases among the youth, between the ages of 15 and 19.
Matric learners attended the recent Rage festivals in KwaZulu-Natal which the Department of Health has dubbed as super-spreader events.
Professor Glenda Gray, president and chief executive of the SA Medical Research Council, said this growing number of cases among young people might be due to fatigue.
“This is pandemic fatigue. These young people have been literally under house arrest for most of this year. If you look at what happened in Europe and the UK in summer, we also saw a resurgence of the disease and it was fuelled by young people who were going out. Young people are going out and they are not practising non-pharmaceutical interventions and they come back to their households and transmit it to the family.
“For this second wave, the youth are part of the propagation cycle. What can be done? It is again to appeal to parents, to people who own clubs and taverns to also take responsibility (to) minimise conditions that can lead to a spread.”
“Matric is finished and people want to celebrate. It has just been normal behaviour of young people. Young people are more riskier than older people… Young people need to be managed by restaurant owners, bar owners and club owners. It’s their duty to implement interventions to minimise transmission. If they want to keep the hospitality industry going, they also have an important role to play and not to be the vehicles of super-spreader events,” Gray said.
She said the country will keep experiencing a resurgence of the disease until a vaccine is rolled out.
“This will continue to happen until we have a vaccine. The only way to control the pandemic is through a vaccine. That will be better for everyone,” Gray said.
She said for the December holidays, if people planned on visiting their families, they needed to be extra vigilant.
“If you go home, you should be mindful of older people. You have to keep your distance, make sure that they wear masks and you wear masks. If you are feeling a little bit of symptoms, keep your distance from people.”
This was echoed by Professor Adrian Puren, acting executive director of the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, who said: “As we head into the holiday season, everyone has a part to play. It’s in our hands. We urge the public to avoid mass meetings or events where there is no or limited physical distancing or ventilation. We urge you to keep physical distancing, use face masks in public, and regularly sanitise or wash hands.”
The Star