South Africa records over 12,000 new COVID cases, 331 deaths

By Hassan Isilow

JOHANNESBURG (AA) - South Africa registered 12,513 COVID-19 infections in a 24-hour period, taking the country’s total number of confirmed cases to 2,075,409, health authorities announced late Monday.

“A further 331 COVID-19 related deaths have been reported, bringing total fatalities to 62,171 to date,” the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) announced.

The institute said Monday's cases saw an increase of 31.6% in the positivity rate, which is higher than Sunday’s infection rate of 30.2%.

Most of the new cases are from Gauteng province, which includes the capital Pretoria and largest city Johannesburg, accounting for 60% of infections, followed by the Western Cape Province with 10% and Limpopo province accounting for 7%, according to the NICD.

South Africa, with a population of around 60 million, has the highest COVID caseload and death toll on the continent. The country is currently undergoing a third wave of infections.

At least 566 COVID-19 patients were admitted to the hospital in the past 24 hours. This means there are currently 14,365 people being treated for COVID-19 in hospitals across the country.

More than 3.31 million people in the country have received their first dose of a vaccine while nearly 480,000 have been fully vaccinated, according to Our World in Data, a tracking website affiliated with Oxford University.