At least 1 150 COVID-19 related hospitalisations recorded in the past 24 hours: NICD

The National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) says it has recorded at least 1 150 new coronavirus-related hospital admissions in the past 24 hours, the largest increase being in Gauteng with 587 new admissions. This as some private health care institutions say they have been forced to divert patients to other facilities due to bed capacity challenges.

Nearly 9 000 new daily infections have been recorded across the country and 127 COVID-19 related deaths.

Latest COVID-19 stats in SA: 

The National Hospital Network’s CEO, Neil Nair, says the vast majority of hospitals in Gauteng are inpatient divert.

“The vast majority of our hospitals in Gauteng are on patient divert, meaning they do not have the capacity to admit additional patients. Patients are being diverted to alternative hospitals; both within the private and public sectors. We are working with the Gauteng department of health; we are sharing information on bed capacity.”

The video below is on concerns over rising COVID-19 hospitalisations in Gauteng:

Children contracting COVID-19

Last week, the NIDC said less children who have been affected by COVID-19 have been hospitalised. The Institute said 9% of children had tested positive for coronavirus since the beginning of 2021.

However, the cases were five times lower than adults.

Epidemiologist Tendesayi Kufa-Chakezha said data did not show whether infants who are admitted to hospital and die later, pass on due to COVID-19-related complications.

“Most of the children that get COVID-19 or test positive for COVID-19 have mild symptoms that don’t require them to be admitted in hospital. This is the major limitation of our data. We don’t always know why these infants are admitted because the data that we get is reported to us. Hospitals fill in an electronic form and they submit the data to NICD for every COVID-19 admission they get. The data that comes through to us [and it] doesn’t always say if the death was not related to COVID-19 or if it was related to COVID-19,” Kufa-Chakezha says.

The video below is a discussion on the increasing number of hospitalisations due to COVID-19 with Dr Kgongwana & Prof Mlisana: