SA records almost 19,000 new Covid-19 cases on Christmas Eve as total infections reach nearly 3.4-million

More than 9,100 people will spend at least some of Christmas Day in hospital undergoing treatment for Covid-19 complications, data from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) on Friday showed.

There were 321 new hospital admissions in the past day, the NICD said, taking the total number of people admitted across SA to 9,129.

The NICD also reported that there were 18,847 new Covid-19 cases recorded on Christmas Eve, taking the total number of confirmed infections to date to 3,393,109.

The province with the highest number of new cases was KwaZulu-Natal (4,815), followed closely by the Western Cape (4,632) and Gauteng (3,376).

The only other province to record more than 1,000 cases in the past day was the Eastern Cape, with 2,101 confirmed infections.

The NICD also reported that according to health department data, there were 81 new Covid-19 related deaths reported in the past day, taking the total number of confirmed fatalities to date to 90,743.

TimesLIVE