Health Minister, Dr Zweli Mkhize, wrapped up his two-day visit to Nelson Mandela Bay today with a veiled warning that if Covid19 infections rates do not come down, measures would have to be introduced to curb this increase.
Addressing a media briefing he said that the country’s numbers have gone up, with over 3000 new cases reported in the past 24 hours.
Mkhize said almost 45% of these cases were from the Eastern Cape, followed by the Western Cape.
"We have these two provinces that are increasingly driving the new numbers as we had in the previous surge. Nelson Mandela Bay tends to very close to half of the total number of positive cases in the Eastern Cape area,” he said.
The Health Minister said, “behavioural change and the use of masks, hand-washing, sanitisers and social distancing, are the best ways for us being able to cope with these infections."
He appealed to communities to play their part saying that those who break the law must face the consequences. He also called for "super-spreader events", adding that there are also volunteers who will help with social distancing at malls and at Post Offices."
Mkhize also said that a number of recommendations had been tabled with them during the visit but that they were still awaiting full reports before these recommendations would be discussed at a national level.
"We are going to be looking at these reports and at a certain point, we obviously need to start looking at the recommendation in relation to what needs to be done at that level, because of the pressures that we already seeing in the hospitals. So, the real decisions will come once those reports have been fielded in," he said.
“At this point, we don't have a specific recommendation as such, we are simply saying that all of these measures have been tabled for us to be able to get full reports and take them for recommendations at a national level."
The Minister said there were a few areas where the increase was “clearly indicating a resurgence.”
He said the government did not want this to become a "national phenomenon", adding that "unless we are able to be careful in the way we deal with this and how we approach the Festive season, we may have that challenge."
Meanwhile, Mkhize said that he would take a report from Traditional Leaders in the Eastern Cape to the National Command Council for consideration.
“Our approach on initiation in the Eastern Cape is that there has to be a risk-adjusted strategy,” he said.
