South Africa has detected 21 157 new COVID-19 infections, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) said on Thursday.
According to the latest data, most of the cases were recorded in KwaZulu-Natal (5 241), Western Cape (4 597) and Gauteng (4 206).
This means there are now 3 374 262 laboratory-confirmed cases since the outbreak. The positivity rate currently stands at 29.1%.
The Department of Health said 75 more people lost their lives to COVID-19 complications, pushing the death toll to 90 662 since the outbreak.
In addition, there are now 9 202 patients receiving hospital treatment due to the respiratory disease after 411 were admitted in the past 24 hours.
The department announced that it administered 42 015 COVID-19 vaccines, 7 620 of which were given to children between the ages of 12 and 17.
This pushes the number of distributed vaccines since the start of the rollout programme to 27 778 860.
The latest data show that 15 488 743 (or 38.92%) adults are now fully jabbed in South Africa, while 17 747 890 over 18s have received at least one shot of the COVID-19 vaccines administered locally.
So far, 881 120 vaccines have been given to children aged between 12 and 17.
Globally, as of 23 December 2021, there have been 276 436 619 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 5 374 744 deaths, reported to the World Health Organisation. – SAnews.gov.za
