It is 1st September, but instead of celebrating Spring Day, most people in the country will be checking their loadshedding schedules thanks to Eskom. Added to this is the latest statistics as it pertains to COVID-19 in South Africa from the National Department of Health (NDoH).
As we now enter our sixth of lockdown, the NDoH has recorded 627 041 cases to date. Added to this is 121 new fatalities being recorded over the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 14 149 at the time of writing.
Looking at the fatalities per province it is reported that 24 were in the Western Cape, 23 in Limpopo, 20 in the Eastern Cape and Gauteng, respectively, 16 in the Free State, nine in the Northern Cape, eight in the North West and one in KwaZulu-Natal.
As always, the NDoH has tried to highlight the number of recoveries as a possible glimmer of hope for the country during this pandemic, with 540 923 recoveries to date. This translates to a recovery rate of 86 percent.
The full breakdown of COVID-19 in South Africa is as follows:
| Province | Confirmed Cases | Recoveries | Active cases | Deaths |
| Western Cape | 106 021 | 97 136 | 8 885 | 3 893 |
| Eastern Cape | 86 163 | 81 373 | 4 790 | 2 896 |
| Northern Cape | 10 726 | 7 003 | 2 859 | 129 |
| Free State | 37 888 | 23 180 | 14 708 | 709 |
| KwaZulu-Natal | 113 006 | 95 993 | 17 013 | 2 139 |
| North West | 25 348 | 18 636 | 6 712 | 248 |
| Mpumalanga | 24 405 | 22 738 | 1 667 | 341 |
| Gauteng | 210 169 | 182 466 | 27 703 | 3 592 |
| Limpopo | 13 265 | 12 398 | 867 | 202 |
| Unknown | 50 | |||
| TOTAL | 627 041 | 540 923 | 86 118 | 14 149 |
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 Marc Ignacio on Unsplash]
