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South Africa has recorded the highest ever single-day spike of COVID-19 new infections since January.
Gauteng accounted for 10 806 of the 17 493 new Covid cases reported by the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) on Wednesday.
This surge in infections has fuelled calls for a harder lockdown in the country’s economic hub.
The NICD says the increase of 17 493 newly confirmed cases represents a “positivity rate” of 24.9%. This is more than double the positivity rate at the start of June.
According to the institute, there are nearly 10 500 Covid-19 patients currently admitted to private and public hospitals countrywide.
This includes 622 new hospital admissions reported on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, 166 people have lost their lives in COVID-19 related deaths since the last report pushing the death toll close to 60 000.
The confirmed death toll is likely to be higher, with delays being experienced in reporting. This is also reflected in the NICD mentioning a figure of 60 318 deaths under the “hospital admissions” section of its latest Covid-19 update.
