More than 200 health care workers in the Northern Cape, including 17 doctors and 84 nurses, have acquired Covid-19.
MORE than 200 health care workers in the Northern Cape, including 17 doctors and 84 nurses, have acquired Covid-19.
Four health care workers have died.
This is according to the national Department of Health, which provided a full breakdown of health care workers who had acquired the coronavirus.
The information provided by Dr Zwelini Mkhize indicates that 17 doctors, 84 nurses and 132 ‘other category’ health care workers in the Northern Cape had tested positive for Covid-19 as at August 4, 2020.
A total of 73 recoveries were reported.
Nationally, a total of 27 360 health care workers contracted Covid-19.
Of those, 60 27 (22%) were from the private sector and 21 333 (78%) were from the public sector.
“The overall infection rate amongst health care workers as compared to the total number of cases identified nationallSy is 5%, which is well below the global average of 10%,” Mkhize stated.
Of these health care workers, 1 644 (6%) are doctors, 14 143 (52%) are nurses, 28 (less than 1%) are port health workers and 11 545 (42%) are from other categories of health workers.
“Sadly, 240 of our health care workers have succumbed to Covid-19 – 37 from the private sector and 203 from the public sector,” said Mkhize.
“We salute these fallen soldiers and pay tribute to them for their commitment to serving the people of South Africa right until the very end. We extend our condolences to all the family, friends and colleagues of these valuable members of society.”
The mortality rate amongst health care workers is 0.9%, while the number of health care workers reported to have recovered as at August 4, 2020 is 16 005, which translates to a 58% recovery rate amongst health care workers.
A snapshot of active cases amongst health care workers as at August 7, 2020 shows that the number of registered cases on this date was 7 500 active cases of which 751 (10%) were in hospital, 6 557 (87%) were in self-isolation and 192 (3%) were being isolated in a facility.
By Wednesday evening, the Northern Cape had registered a total of 6 597 positive Covid-19 cases, of which 3 698 had recovered and 3 189 were active cases.
The death toll in the Province from the virus was 68 according to the statistics.
The Sol Plaatje Municipality had the most positive cases in the Province at 2 334, followed by Ga-Segonyana (Kuruman) with a total of 967 cases and Umsobomvu (Colesberg) with 835.
In South Africa, the cumulative Covid-19 cases as of Wednesday evening was 568 919 since the first case was recorded on March 5, while the national death toll has surpassed 11 000.
The number of people who have recuperated stood at 432 029, which translates to a recovery rate of 75.9%.
Gauteng remains the hardest-hit province with 194 685 cases, followed by KwaZulu-Natal with 101 499, Western Cape 100 536 and Eastern Cape 82 779.
Free State has 29 578 cases, North West 22 205, Mpumalanga 19 755 and Limpopo 10 875, while 50 cases were unallocated.
According to the World Health Organization, there are now 20 162 474 cases and 737 417 deaths globally.
