Covid-19 update: SA records 5,604 new cases and 41 deaths

South Africa on Boxing Day recorded 5,604 new Covid-19 cases, bringing the total number of laboratory-confirmed cases to 3,413,540 since the start of the pandemic.

The National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) said this increase represented a 27.2% positivity rate.

A further 41 Covid related deaths were reported, bringing total fatalities to 90,814 to date.

21,059,203 tests were conducted in both public and private sectors.

Provincial breakdown

The majority of new cases on Sunday were from the Western Cape 1,565 (28%) followed by KwaZulu-Natal 1,459 (26%).

Gauteng accounted for 17%; Eastern Cape accounted for 9%. Free State 5% and North West each accounted for 5%, Mpumalanga 4%. Limpopo and Northern Cape each accounted for 3% of new cases.

The proportion of positive new cases/total new tested on Boxing Day was 27.2%, which is higher than on Christmas Day (25.7%). The seven-day average was 28.5%, which is lower than Saturday (29.0%).

Hospital admissions

In terms of hospital admissions, there was an increase of 42 hospital admissions in the past 24 hours.

The following table is a summary of reported Covid-19 admissions by sector.

Compiled by Thapelo Lekabe

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