South Africa reached an all-time high of new Covid-19 cases Thursday night, with Health Minister Joe Phaahla warning citizens that the omicron variant was highly transmissible that current protocol precautions should not be eased at all levels to protect them.
The minister said the new infections data showed that the new mutant, with a presence in all nine provinces of the country, was not relentless in its transmissions.
Speaking during a virtual media briefing of his government’s efforts to fight the pandemic, he said the new coronavirus infections continued to rise rapidly across the country as the cases reached 11,535 by the end of Thursday.
Phaahla said: “Over the last seven days, the new spike has moved through the whole of Gauteng, and it is also registering a presence in all nine provinces.”
“Numbers starting to rise in the Western Cape, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, North West and Mpumalanga — all with high positivity rates,” he said.
He added: “While we are dealing with a few days and limited data, the indications are that this variant is highly transmissible, including infections of people who have been vaccinated, but the infections are causing mostly mild illness — especially for those who are vaccinated.”
Phaahla also reiterated his call to people who had not received their second Pfizer dose to complete their jabs soon due to the high transmissibility of the new variant.
“We call on all those who have not completed the full vaccination with the Pfizer vaccine to do so. There are many who have taken only one dose, even though they have long been due for the second dose,” he said.
“We really appeal to them to come forward and complete their vaccination so they can be fully protected because what we have also seen is, while having at least one dose does provide some protection, it is just not enough because it does not provide the full protection which is required,” the minister added.
NM/as/APA