SA CONFIRMS FIRST POSITIVE CASE OF COVID-19

… Italy shuts all schools, universities as global battle intensifies

JOHANNESBURG - Health Minister Zweli Mkhize has confirmed that South Africa's first suspected case of Covid-19 has tested positive.

Mkhize released a statement yesterday confirming that the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NCID) confirmed a positive test.

"The patient is a 38-yearold male who travelled to Italy with his wife. They were part of a group of 10 people and they arrived back in South Africa on March 1," Mkhize said in the statement.

"The patient consulted a private general practitioner on March 3 with symptoms of fever, headache, malaise, a sore throat and a cough."

The practice nurse then took swabs and delivered it to the laboratory. The patient has been self-isolating since March 3.

"The couple also has two children. The Emergency Operating Centre has identified the contacts by interviewing the patient and doctor. The tracer team has been deployed to KwaZulu-Natal with epidemiologists and clinicians from the NICD."

And addressing lawmakers in Cape Town yesterday,

Mkhize warned that the country’s health system would be tested by the coronavirus, after it earlier confirmed its first case.

Mkhize said citizens quarantined in China will be returning home in the next few days and added that South Africa was working with the World Health Organisation (WHO) and other institutions to help diagnose the virus, called COVID-19, across Africa.

“I think we need to be upfront about it ... Our system will be tested by the impact of coronavirus,” he said.

Meanwhile, Italy shut all schools and universities on Wednesday in a bid to stop the deadly novel coronavirus (Covid-19) from spreading, as Germany warned the outbreak had turned into a global pandemic.

More than 90, 000 people have been infected and around 3, 200 have died worldwide from the virus, which has now reached some 80 countries and territories.

The vast majority of global deaths and infections are in China, where Covid-19 first emerged late last year, but figures from Beijing on Wednesday showed just 119 new cases over the previous 24 hours – the lowest daily number since January.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has so far stopped short of declaring a pandemic, but fear of the virus' spread has prompted panic buying, hoarding and theft, along with warnings over shortages of protective gear.

But in Germany, health minister Jens Spahn used the term "global pandemic" – meaning it is spreading in several regions through local transmission – telling lawmakers "we have not yet reached the peak of the outbreak."