Fears that province following the pattern of Western Cape
On March 19, the Eastern Cape’s “patient zero” tested positive for Covid-19.
Now, some 79 days later, the province has already recorded its 100th death and is the second-most infected province in SA.
Only the Western Cape’s 30,379 cases outnumber the Eastern Cape’s 5,629 — and, worryingly, it has done significantly fewer tests than Gauteng, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal.
In terms of deaths, the Eastern Cape’s 101 was more than double Gauteng’s 47.
Only the Western Cape has more, with 729 recorded by Saturday night.
KwaZulu-Natal, with 2,500 fewer cases than Gauteng and the Eastern Cape, had recorded 61 deaths by Saturday.
Yesterday’s figures had not been released by the time of publication.
The situation is dire, and health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize last week said he was worried that the Eastern Cape was following the same pattern as its western neighbour.
Already, the daily statistics provided by the health ministry show where this concern comes from.
Other statistics from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) also highlight the problem.
The Eastern Cape’s cases are doubling every two to three days, a situation the Western Cape (which is growing at more than 1,000 cases a day) found itself in when it had about the same figures as the Eastern Cape does now.
Gauteng had similar case numbers to the Eastern Cape at the weekend, but it was testing significantly more people.
Also, the proportion of positive tests in the Eastern Cape is second only to the Western Cape.
Figures provided in an NICD report show that, for the period May 3-23:
● 92,056 tests were conducted in Gauteng;
● 72,267 were conducted in the Western Cape;
● 45,424 were conducted in KZN;
● 27,165 were conducted in the Eastern Cape;
● 13,801 were conducted in the Free State;
● 9,643 were conducted in Mpumalanga;
● 7,493 were conducted in Limpopo;
● 6,343 were conducted in North West;
● 3,417 were conducted in the Northern Cape;
● 2,477 tests were unallocated. In the same period the Western Cape had 11,277 positive tests, and the Eastern Cape 1,655, while Gauteng had 1,028 and KZN 676. In the final week of that period (May 1723) the Western Cape had 4,397 positive tests (proportional positives of 17.5%), the Eastern Cape 486 (8.8%), Gauteng 383 (1.8%) and KZN 241 (2.1%).
This demonstrates that the Eastern Cape’s rate of infection has accelerated rapidly and, while its new case numbers have been similar to those reported by Gauteng, this province had performed more than four times as many tests in the same period.
It was a trend that continued, the NICD said in a subsequent report covering May 24-30.
“In the past week Western Cape and Gauteng provinces performed the largest numbers of tests, accounting for 61.5% of tests nationally.
“Western Cape (20.5%) and Eastern Cape (12.2%) provinces continued to have the highest proportions testing positive,” the report stated.
And the true number of cases could be a lot higher, with the NICD acknowledging that testing backlogs were a concern — something Mkhize has acknowledged in recent weeks.
“There has been a decrease in the volume of tests conducted over the past three weeks, which is likely owing to limited availability of testing kits,” the NICD states.
“The overall proportion testing positive continued to increase to 9.6% in week 22, with increases observed in both the public and private sectors.
Mkhize said last night the government was “turning its attention” to the Eastern Cape this week after visits to the Western Cape last week.
Of particular concern was movement between the Eastern and Western Cape.
On testing backlogs, the ministry said it was “clearing” these.