COVID-19 LIVE UPDATES | SANDF medics to help as Eastern Cape struggles to cope with Covid-19 surge

July 5 2020 - 08:41

SANDF medics to help as Eastern Cape struggles to cope with Covid-19 surge

Getting tested for Covid-19 at Livingstone Hospital in Nelson Mandela Bay could take at least two days of queueing from as early as 5am — and even that is no guarantee you will be helped as the National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS) mobile clinic can test only 80 people a day.

The 80 people due to be tested on Friday, when the Sunday Times visited the site, had registered at least two days before. Those in the long queue of people turned away were advised to register at the Korsten Health Centre on Monday in the hope of getting tested on Tuesday.

July 5 2020 - 08:38

July 5 2020 - 07:41

Ghana president self-isolates despite negative Covid-19 test

Ghana's president has gone into self-isolation for two weeks as a precautionary measure despite testing negative for Covid-19, the government said, after one of his contacts was confirmed to have the illness.

President Nana Akufo-Addo began his quarantine on Saturday and will be working from the presidential villa in Accra, capital of the West African country, the information minister said in a statement.

July 5 2020 - 06:52

Gauteng Covid-19 SOS: province pleads for hard lockdown regulations to curb surge

The Gauteng government wants the National Coronavirus Command Council (NCCC) to allow it to reintroduce hard lockdown regulations in an attempt to curb soaring Covid-19 numbers in the province.

If approved, the move could see SA's economic powerhouse being shut down for up to two weeks at a time.

"Nobody goes to work and no-one moves. Then the economy opens up again for a particular period of time and then it closes again. So at least there is predictability and you can control infections in that way," health MEC Bandile Masuku said yesterday.

July 5 2020 - 06:37

Probe called into R4.8m Covid info campaign

Over four days in May, while SA was in a strict level 4 lockdown, community workers embarked on a door-to-door Covid-19 awareness campaign in the Eastern Cape.

The company contracted by the OR Tambo district municipality to carry out the campaign invoiced R4.8m for the job, claiming its employees had spoken to 6,400 people.

Yet many of those listed on the community workers’ forms as having been visited told the Sunday Times no one has ever knocked on their door to give them information on Covid-19.

July 5 2020 - 00:09

SA hits 3,026 Covid-19 deaths as cases pass 10,000 in one day for first time

SA recorded its 3,026th Covid-19 fatality on Saturday, just 99 days after the first death was reported in the country on March 27.

There were also more than 10,000 cases in a single day for the first time. Gauteng accounted for more than 5,000 of these cases.