Zach Crawford
(ANSA) – JOHANNESBURG, Dec 31 – South Africa, where a new variant of Covid-19 was revealed last month, has announced that it has passed the peak of the Omicron wave without a significant increase in the number of deaths.
The presidency said, in a statement, that “all indications indicate that the country may have passed the peak of the fourth wave” of the epidemic.
He explained that “a slight increase in the number of deaths was observed in all governorates.” New infections fell 30% last week (89,781) compared to the previous week (127,753). Hospital admissions fell in eight of the nine provinces. “Although the Omicron variant is highly transmissible, hospitalization rates were lower than in previous waves,” the presidency said.
Omicron, with a large number of mutations raising concerns about vaccine resistance, was first identified in Botswana and South Africa in late November. It quickly became dominant in South Africa, causing the number of infections to skyrocket to more than 26,000 per day in mid-December, according to official statistics. The alternative is currently present in about 100 countries, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Very contagious, it also affects people who have been vaccinated or who have already had the virus.
Officially the worst affected African country, South Africa has more than 3.4 million cases and 91,000 deaths from Covid-19. Less than 13,000 cases were detected in the last 24 hours. (Dealing).
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Laurence Malcom
