‘Hard lockdown is unnecessary’

The current spike in Covid-19 cases across the country is normal and no cause for government to initiate a harder lockdown, the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) says.

The council has added its voice to the chorus of experts cautioning the government against a panicked reaction to the increasing rates of infection, including shutting down parts of the economy.

In the past few weeks, cases have been fluctuating between 1,000 and 2,000 a day. Last Thursday it peaked at 1,866 cases.

According to Professor Jeffrey Mphahlele, vice-president for research at the council, social events were unexpectedly high for this time of the year, although lack of vigilance by those attending large gatherings has contributed the most to the uptick.

He said it was concerning that people were still dying from the virus.

Mphahlele warned that cases were likely to reach uncontrollable levels by autumn next year, should the rate of infection continue to increase.

It was key to keep the numbers stable over the summer.

Instead of a hard lockdown, the government might consider upgrading to Level 2 or 3 to prevent this. As it stood, however, there was no indication this would happen soon.

“Obviously, in the process, the bad thing is that we are losing lives because even if you have 50 or 70 people dying every day, ideally we don’t want anyone dying from Covid-19. So that is the sad part,” said Mphahele.

“But in terms of the number of cases, if you look nationally I think it’s not something that will really push the government to consider increasing the level of the lockdown from where we are. That is my opinion.

“On many days you will get fluctuations, but if you look at the seven-day average, you will see the increases aren’t significant [enough] to really call for the government to initiate a higher level of lockdown.”

According to Mphahlele, not enough time had passed for scientists to determine whether Covid-19 was a seasonal virus.

The likelihood of numbers increasing over the summer months would have far more to do with human behaviour than the scorching heat.

But it would be disastrous, he warned, for the government to ride out the festive season with no lockdown or regulations at all.

“That is dangerous. You can’t do that because I think first of all it is non-scientific and also it is putting human lives at risk.

“It’s not like people are not dying, as I said. So if you allow the situation to continue and encourage people not to observe pharmaceutical interventions the situation might get out of control.”

– simnikiweh@citizen.co.za

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