DA welcomes Ramaphosa's decision to declare Nelson Mandela Bay a hotspot

 The DA has welcomed Cyril Ramaphosa's announcement to declare Nelson Mandela Bay municipality a Covid-19 hotspot on Thursday.

DA Leader John Steenhuisen reiterated the president’s call for South Africans to play their part in preventing the spread of infections.

“Significant behavioural changes are still the best weapon to combat not only the spread of infections but also to prevent other medical trauma from clogging up our hospitals and ICU beds. This behavioural change needs to also apply to social gatherings over this holiday season. We may remain on level 1, which allows for substantial indoor gatherings of up to 250 people, but such a large gathering would be extremely irresponsible given everything we know now about the spread of this airborne virus,” Steenhuisen said.

He said the government should also be doing all it can to ensure that South Africans have access to the same protection as the rest of the world.

“This should have started by securing a spot at the front of the queue for Covid vaccines. Unfortunately, our government has bungled this badly by missing the deadline for the first payment in the Covax vaccine initiative. This means we now fall back in the queue, and South Africans might have to wait even longer before securing a vaccine.

“This is unacceptable, and the government owes the country a detailed and honest explanation of exactly what went wrong. It is crucial that this payment is made this week  and that we book our spot in the queue,” he added.

With regards to the rising numbers of infections in the Garden Route area, “we have full confidence in the preparation and capacity of the Western Cape government to identify and contain any further outbreaks or hotspots as we go into this crucial holiday season,” Steenhuisen said.

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