HomeWeekly Roundup
Weekly Roundup
Wits scientist says firms are 'exploiting ignorance and fear' with deep cleans
Scientists say “deep cleans” of offices, schools and other spaces every time a positive case is reported, is unnecessary. A Bizcommunity report says many...
Compensation Fund: Bulk of workplace medical aid claims are from women
Women, especially nurses and other frontline healthcare workers, are bearing the brunt of COVID-19, the Compensation Fund says. Labour department spokesperson Teboho Thejane said...
SA government awards R18m to produce rapid COVID-19 tests
In a bid to ramp up South Africa's ability to produce reagents and test kits for COVID-19, R18m in funding has been awarded to...
StatsSA Mid-Year Population Estimates: Aids-related deaths drop by almost half since 2002
It is estimated that the proportion of Aids-related deaths has declined by almost half, from 30.6% of all deaths in 2002 to just over...
Discovery Health: Pandemic may be past its peak in Western Cape
The Western Cape may have already reached the peak of its coronavirus outbreak. Business Day reports that this is according to South Africa’s biggest...
Africa Centres for Disease Control urges more testing and mask wearing
African countries must carry out more coronavirus testing and make people use masks, a regional disease control body said as cases topped half a...
Many hand sanitisers don't comply with SA government regulations
If tests on a sample of hand sanitisers conducted by a private, accredited laboratory in KwaZulu-Natal are anything to go by, almost half are...
DA: Private sector builds full field hospital in 7 weeks; state lays not a brick in 3 months
The private sector can build a fully equipped field hospital with 1,450 beds in just seven weeks. The public health department has yet to...
UK govt's science advisory group: Coronavirus spreads fastest at 4ºC
Coronavirus spreads fastest at 4ºC, government scientists have decided, amid mounting concern over the threat of a winter resurgence. The Daily Telegraph reports that...
Trump administration targets Dr Anthony Fauci's 'errors'
US infectious disease chief Dr Anthony Fauci is being targeted by the Trump administration as tensions rise between the health expert and the president....
COVID-19 risks blowing HIV progress 'way off course’ — UNAIDS
The UNAIDS 2020 Global Aids report on the global Aids epidemic shows that 2020 targets will not be met because of deeply unequal success;...
SAMRC report: COVID-19 death toll may be higher than reported
COVID-19 has sent the number of deaths in South Africa “significantly higher than the predicted number based on historical data”. The Times reports that...
'Overwhelmed' Eastern Cape calls for SANDF help to fight pandemic
Eastern Cape Premier Oscar Mabuyane has admitted the province's hospitals are "overwhelmed" in the fight against COVID-19, and has asked national government for the...
Eastern Cape wants museums and hostels as field hospitals for risky self-isolators
The Eastern Cape government plans to turn 18 state-owned properties, such as museums and hostels, into field hospitals after they found that people engaged...
Eastern Cape's Nelson Mandela Bay has only 2 ambulances for pandemic patients
Nelson Mandela Bay has only two state ambulances for the transport of COVID-19 patients – one is operating in Port Elizabeth and the other...
Western Cape Premier: COVID-19 peak likely to be flatter, later and longer
Statement by Premier Alan Winde at the weekly COVID-19 digital press conference:
At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Western Cape, I made...
Western Cape strategy to protect diabetics with COVID-19
The Western Cape has launched an action plan that focuses on diabetic people who have tested positive for COVID-19.
Daily Maverick reports that the action...
COVID-19 fears lead to decrease in Groote Schuur cancer patient referrals
Fear of contracting COVID-19 has led to a decrease in new cancer patients referred to Groote Schuur Hospital in the last two months and...
Sierra Leone doctors treating COVID-19 patients go on strike
Doctors treating COVID-19 patients in Sierra Leone has gone on strike over unpaid bonuses, leaving patients in some of the main treatment centres without...
Brazil's COVID-sceptical president tests positive for coronavirus
The Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, has announced live on television he has tested positive for coronavirus. The Guardian reports that Bolsonaro, 65, has repeatedly...
UK arrivals from 'red list' countries can pay for COVID-19 test to avoid quarantine
Passengers arriving at Heathrow airport from “red list” countries like the US will be able to pay for COVID-19 tests to beat quarantine, under...
NICD says pandemic precautions reducing seasonal flu and rabies
The National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) says that the precautions people are practising – such as mask-wearing, sanitising and social distancing to prevent...
Miner's supplement public sector in efforts against COVID-19
Platinum group metals miner Royal Bafokeng Platinum (RBPlat), together with the North West Health Department, has officially opened the 200-bed Royal Bafokeng Platinum Field...
Nursing and midwifery scopes of practice proposals out for comment
Comment is sought within one month on draft regulations developed with the aim of determining nursing and midwifery scopes of practice and, in some...
Texas Medical Association: Activity risk of COVID-19 infection list
The Texas Medical Association (TMA) has published a list ranking the risk of infection with COVID-19 for a wide range of activities, including going...
Oxfam SA report on healthcare worker inequality
A report on health care inequality says while the sector relies heavily on women, they are underpaid and forced to work long hours. The...
SA's healthcare workers want a 6-month exemption from taxation
As South Africa’s COVID-19 coronavirus numbers continue to rise, City Press reports that long-simmering healthcare worker complaints are boiling over. Tiyese Jeranji spoke to...
Limpopo accuses 'certain doctors' of fake certificates for teachers
Limpopo's Provincial Coronavirus Command Council (PCCC) has accused some teachers of submitting fake doctor's certificates, on their vulnerability to COVID-19 because of comorbidities, to...
Slow-payer Gauteng Health owes R1.2bn to over 800 companies
The Gauteng Health Department owes R1.209bn to 823 companies for more than 90 days even though they are legally required to be paid within...
More violent incidents reported at Soweto mental health hospital
Bheki Mlangeni District Hospital in Soweto has recorded four more violent incidents by mental health patients since the stabbing to death by a psychiatric...
KZN hospital workers strike over COVID-19 fears
Health workers have halted operations at Rietvlei Hospital, in Umzimkhulu, in southern KwaZulu-Natal demanding that the facility be sanitised after patients and nurses tested...
Nurses at Netcare hospital in Johannesburg test COVID-19 positive
Several nurses at Linksfield Netcare Hospital in Orange Grove, Johannesburg, have reportedly contracted COVID-19. News24 reports that according to one of those who tested...
COVID-19 test samples found dumped in the Eastern Cape
Hundreds of COVID-19 test samples have been found dumped next to the N2 highway near Mdantsane in East London. eNCA reports that the used...
Pricing of Gilead's remdesivir is 'fairly restrained'
Medicine may be a science but drug pricing is definitely an art. Reuters Health reports that that’s especially true of Gilead Sciences’ treatment for...
Mkhize: Invasive ventilation of COVID-19 patients should be avoided if possible
Ventilating COVID-19 patients is not always in their best interest. The Times reports that this is according to Health Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize who...
WHO and key partners unveil plan to buy 2bn doses of COVID-19 vaccine
The World Health Organisation and key partners have unveiled a plan to purchase 2bn doses of COVID-19 vaccines for the highest risk populations of...
China tests its candidate COVID-19 vaccine on troops
Chinese troops will be among the first to get jabs of one of China’s leading COVID-19 vaccine candidates, reports Fortune. The Chinese biotech firm...
Gauteng legislature approves hospital tariff hike
The Gauteng provincial legislature's committee on scrutiny of subordinate legislation has approved regulations which gives effect to the annual adjustment fee of 4.9% for...
SA must change social behaviour to beat COVID-19 — Mkhize
Speaking at the launch of a field hospital in Uitenhage in the Eastern Cape, South Africa’s Health Minister Zweli Mkhize said that on the...
Madhi: Likely 1m COVID-19 cases in SA
Professor Shabir Madhi, lead researcher on the COVID-19 vaccine trial that has started in South Africa, says there are likely a million South Africans...