GARDEN ROUTE NEWS - The Garden Route, like the rest of the Western Cape, passed the peak of the Covid-19 fourth wave last week.

A consistent decline in the number of active Covid-19 cases has been reported in the district in the last two weeks. 

According to the Western Cape Covid-19 Dashboard, as of Tuesday 11 January, the district had 3 927 reported active cases (George 1 247, Mossel Bay 999, Knysna 520, Hessequa 420, Bitou 389, Oudtshoorn 232 and Kannaland 120). This is a 12,6% drop in five days.

Western Cape Premier Alan Winde last week called on National Government to allow the national state of disaster to expire. On 10 December, it was extended to 15 January. Winde said data shows that the province has the ability and capacity to manage Covid-19 without a disaster declaration. 

The focus must now shift from Covid-19 to dealing with "pandemic number 2" - poverty and the high unemployment rates. 

Plans for dealing with this in the Western Cape will be revealed in the coming weeks.

According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), the Western Cape reported 1 151 new cases on 11 January, which accounted for 20% of the 5 668 cases reported nationally. The national test positivity rate has dropped to 14%.

• Government lifted the curfew on 30 December based on the country having passed the peak of the fourth wave as well as vaccination levels and available capacity in the health sector.

• The South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (Sahpra) during the holiday period approved booster shots for both the Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer vaccines.

• A new "variant", dubbed Deltacron, has been detected in Cyprus, according to a Bloomberg news report at the weekend. The variant has Omicron-like genetic signatures within the delta genome, according to the report. But a World Health Organisation expert reacting to the report was quoted later as having said that the "variant" is likely a result of lab contamination.

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