South Africa recorded 9 446 new cases on Sunday, pushing the total number of cases to 921 922.<\/p>\n
An additional 152 COVID-19 related deaths were reported, with the Eastern Cape reporting 105 fatalities overnight.<\/p>\n
Thirty deaths occurred in the Western Cape, eight in KwaZulu-Natal, five in the Free State, three in Mpumalanga and one in Gauteng.<\/p>\n
This brings the death toll to 24 691 since the outbreak.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe convey our condolences to the loved ones of the departed and thank the health workers who treated the deceased,\u201d said Health Minister, Dr Zweli Mkhize.<\/p>\n
The Western Cape has the highest number of active cases with 34 979, followed by KwaZulu-Natal with 29 527, Gauteng 15 095 and Eastern Cape 13 065.<\/p>\n
The Free State has 4 402 cases, Northern Cape 2 009, North West 1 991, Limpopo 1 149 and Mpumalanga 1 100.<\/p>\n
According to the latest data, there are 793 914 patients who recovered COVID-19.<\/p>\n
The information is based on the 6 140 839 tests conducted to date, with 40 466 conducted since the last report.<\/p>\n
While the country is still grappling with the second wave, the Minister announced on Friday that a group of scientists discovered a new Coronavirus variant called 501.V2, which is spreading rapidly in the country.<\/p>\n
According to Mkhize, this variant is seeing a larger proportion of younger patients with no comorbidities develop serious illness.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe evidence that has been collated, therefore, strongly suggests that the current second wave we are experiencing is being driven by this new variant.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, scientists in the United Kingdom have also warned about this new variant of the virus, prompting the UK to introduce tighter restrictions during the festive season.<\/p>\n
According to reports, countries like Canada, South America, Argentina, Chile and Colombia have all suspended direct flights to and from the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n
Globally, there are 75 110 651 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 1 680 395 deaths reported to the World Health Organisation. \u2013 SAnews.gov.za<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" South Africa recorded 9 446 new cases on Sunday, pushing the total number of cases to 921 922. An additional 152 COVID-19 related deaths were reported, with the Eastern Cape reporting 105 fatalities overnight. Thirty deaths occurred in the Western Cape, eight in KwaZulu-Natal, five in the Free State, three in Mpumalanga and one in Gauteng. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-175614","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-sanews","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175614"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175614\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}