Minister of Health, Dr Zweli Mkhize, last night briefed the media while in Bloemfontein and said that so far 45 people recovered from the virus. He adds due to the 21-day national lockdown, there has been a respite in the numbers of infections in the country. 

This, after the national institute of communicable diseases (NICD) raised concern over internal or local transmission. Mkhize, however, says so far 5 deaths have been reported and they are further waiting for clarification and verification on 2 more deaths.

Mkhize earlier on Thursday afternoon oversaw a massive screening of Heidedal residents in Bloemfontein in the Free State.

"We want to say to our people we can fight this infection. We can defeat it. We need to flatten the curve (and) that is going to be very important for us, " he adds.

He further says that people must stay at home when asked to, create social distancing, wear masks and wash/disinfect hands regularly.

Mkhize, said he was impressed  with the tracking and tracing team of coronavirus patient contacts in the Free State. He was addressing the media at Universitas Hospital in Bloemfontein with the Covid-19 Task team along with the Premier, Sisi Ntombela, and MEC for Health, Montsheng Tsiu.

Mkhize was particularly impressed with how the team was able to track  about 1700 contacts of people who might have been in contact with positive Covid-19 patients in the province. 

He added that 1600 of those have already been done and they are now looking for or rounding up a small number of those contacts.

He also reiterated that Mangaung, which includes Bloemfontein, is an area of concern due to the nature of how the infection spread - stemming from a church gathering.

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