Thus far the province has conducted 7500 tests from the 100 000 kits that were initially distributed to all health facilities in the province at the onset of the outbreak in the country. The surplus has enabled the department to intensify their testing efforts going from only testing symptomatic contacts or those with travel history, to now testing all close contacts. Of the 838 contacts that have been identified thus far close to 700 have undergone testing for COVID-19. The Northern Cape now has 25 active cases and one reported death.

Web: Provincial health MEC, Mase Manopole, reveals in a statement that the new cases lie mainly in the Pixley ka Seme District. She says “two people in Umsobomvu Local Municipality, two people in Ubuntu local municipality and one person in Siyancuma Local Municipality - the first person in this local municipality”. However the vast majority of overall cases in the province continue to lie in the Francis Baard District, Sol Plaatje local municipality in particular which has 20 of the 31 confirmed cases in that district. It is important to note that most of the confirmed cases in Francis Baard have recovered, leaving that District with a mere nine active cases, far less than Pixley ka Seme at this stage.

Manopole is expected to visit the districts with the highest number of cases in due course, to determine how the contact tracing programme is doing and offer additional support to healthcare workers whom she thanked for their tireless efforts to look after the ill and curb the spread of the virus in the process.

OFM News