‘SA could have entered the COVID-19 5th wave’

The Health Minister Dr Joe Phaahla says despite the sharp rise in new COVID-19 cases in the past few days, there is still a debate on whether or not the country is officially in the fifth wave.

He says Gauteng accounts for 53% of new infection cases, followed by KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape.

Dr Phaahla has been briefing the media on government efforts in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The question, which is now on top of our minds, is whether we have entered the 5th wave. Professor Salim Abdool Karim, previous chair of the ministerial advisory committee, in his analysis believes that we have entered the 5th wave.”

“It is argued that we can only say we have entered the 5th wave if there is a sustained more that 6 237 cases per day. We are already over 6300. So it does suggest that we may be entering the in the 5th wave. We just have to wait for a few more days to be sure,” explains the minister.

Below is the live stream of the media briefing:

On Thursday, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) reported 4 146 new COVID-19 cases in South Africa.

This brings the total number of laboratory-confirmed cases to 3 780 444.

The institute says there may be a backlog of COVID-19 mortality cases reported as a result of the ongoing audit exercise by the national Department of Health.

“Today National Department of Health reports four deaths that occurred in the past 24 – 48 hours. Total fatalities are 100,355 to date,” says the NICD.

Below are COVID-19 statistics in South Africa: