By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Health minister Zweli Mkhize said in a statement that the cumulative number of cases in South Africa now stands at 1 518 979.
This is an increase of of 1 313 new Covid-19-related cases in the last 24 hours.
The number of fatalities now stands at 50 566 after 104 more Covid-19 deaths were reported: Free State 29, Western Cape 17, Gauteng 16, Northern Cape 15, Limpopo 12, KwaZulu-Natal 8, Eastern Cape 4, Mpumalanga 3 and North West 0.
The number of recoveries has risen to 1 437 050, representing a recovery rate of 94.6%. The cumulative total of tests conducted to date is 9 207 347, with 29 024 new tests recorded since the last report.
South Africa’s 100,000th Covid-19 vaccine has been administered, 17 days after the first shot was given out on February 17.
Meanwhile the health department has been accused of lying to parliament about the procurement of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine currently being administrated nationwide.
Leading the charge in parliament’s health portfolio committee on Friday was EFF MP Naledi Chirwa, who told deputy health minister Dr Joe Phaahla, along with his director-general Dr Sandile Buthelezi, that they had deliberately misled parliament on a number of issues pertaining to the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines.
“What do we do with an executive that lies to the portfolio committee? You lie in the news, you lie in your statements. You are liars. What must we do with the fact that you keep coming to the portfolio committee with lies? You lie about important issues,” said an angry Chirwa.
She was speaking during a question-and-answer session in the portfolio committee during which Phaahla had earlier revealed that the J&J vaccine currently being administered was not formally approved by the SA Health Products Regulatory Authority (Sahpra).
Phaahla, who was accompanied by Buthelezi and other health officials to update parliament on the vaccine rollout, also revealed the vaccines being used in the current rollout programme were part of a batch J&J was using to conduct their worldwide human “expanded study”.
“It is legally regarded as an expanded study because as we are rolling out, the vaccine is not registered. The documentation for the application for registration of the vaccine has been submitted to Sahpra and documentation has also been submitted to other authorities,” Phaahla said.
After the department’s presentation, MPs were left confused as to whether SA was currently rolling out a procedurally-procured J&J vaccine or whether health-care workers were part of a human trial on the J&J vaccine.