While this weekend we have to deal with COVID-19 in South Africa once again, it also brings with it the added pressure of stage 2 loadshedding, which is scheduled to last until Monday morning.

While a downgrade in stages from earlier in the week is welcome, stage 2 still brings with it challenges and the concern that it could be raised again should further generating units fail at Eskom.

Either way, March is turning into a rather tough month. That said, the numbers for the spread of the virus this week are relatively low.

To that end the latest report from the National Department of Health (NDoH) confirms that 1 868 new cases have been recorded in the past 24 hours, as the total number of infections to date now rises to 3 690 291.

The department also notes that 25 fatalities have been reported too, with the death toll related to the spread of COVID-19 in South Africa currently sitting at 99 681.

As for other key figures, the recovery rate remains unmoved at 96.8 percent, while more than 22.78 million tests have been conducted so far.

Shifting to the vaccine rollout, turnout to sites across the country continues to drop slightly, with 91 203 jabs administered in the past 24 hours. As of 17:00 on 10th March 2022, a total of 32 421 223 vaccines have been administered so far.

The full outlook for COVID-19 in South Africa follows on below:

• 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 Skylar McKissack on Unsplash]