Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize says 20 million South Africans have been screened for the coronavirus over the past few months as the country approaches a 'storm' with rising cases and deaths expected.
"These figures are much lower than the 20% we had initially projected and represented a public health response that has placed emphasis on proactive, preventative medicine. This has resulted in some of the best Covid-19 health indicators in the world We can keep this up but it requires a concerted effort by all South Africans to adopt the necessary behaviour change that will keep us all safe and ensure our morbidity and mortality rates remain low," Mkhize said.
The minister also commended the government's testing strategy with over 1,2 million tests being conducted in four months. A few weeks ago the country's testing backlog had been recorded at over 100 000, but Mkhize said this has been largely decreased to 46 493. The country has also been able to increase bed facilities through established quarantine facilities and there are now over 27 000 beds available for use.
Another issue facing the country's fight against the pandemic was the large number of healthcare workers who were infected with the virus. There have been 3 583 healthcare workers who have tested positive and 34 have died. We thank VW as a company, the provincial government, the mayor, the premier, and the provincial health department for the work they have done in making this facility available.
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