Last night President Cyril Ramaphosa addressed the nation regarding restrictions that would be imposed for the Easter weekend to try to control COVID-19 in South Africa. Among them was banning the sale of alcohol for offsite consumption, along with increasing the limits fr gatherings, while the curfew would remain as it currently is under alert level 1 lockdown.

It remains to be seen what impact these restrictions will have, especially as there are fears that a third wave of infections could happen during a holiday period, as was the case during the festive season at the beginning of the year.

While we await that outcome, the president has urged all South Africans to remain vigilant and adhere to regulations over the coming days and weeks. This as the steady progress we’ve made in bringing down the number of new daily infections can quickly be undone.

Looking at the latest report from the National Department of Health (NDoH), 756 new cases have been reported over the past 24 hours, with the total to date now sitting at 1 546 735. The department also confirms 1 473 588 recoveries as the recovery rate remains ta 95 percent.

As for other key statistics, 251 707 vaccines have been administered to date and 78 new fatalities have unfortunately been recorded over the past 24 hours. This has seen the death toll related to COVID-19 in South Africa rise to 52 788.

The full breakdown of COVID-19 in South Africa is as follows:

As always, in order to stay up to date with the spread of COVID-19 in South Africa and abroad, we advise the following materials and platforms:

• Dr Zweli Mkhize on Twitter
• COVID-19 Connect on WhatsApp – add 0600 123 456 as a contact and say “Hi”.
• World Health Organisation
• SA Coronavirus website
• SA Government
• SA Presidency

[Image – Photo by Louis Hansel @shotsoflouis on Unsplash]