South Africa Records 24,270 Covid-19 Cases as Country Sees Highest Ever Single-Day Increase

South Africa saw its highest ever number of single-day Covid-19 infections on Friday, with 24,270 new cases recorded in 24 hours.

This is significantly higher than the previous single-day high of 21,980 recorded on January 8.

Figures from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) on Friday showed that the new infections took the country to another grim milestone: there have now been more than 2m cumulative cases recorded.

As of Friday, there have been 2,019,826 infections recorded countrywide since the outbreak of the coronavirus in March 2020.

Gauteng again led in terms of new daily infections, accounting for 14,198 cases. The Western Cape was next with 2,606 cases.

There were also 303 more Covid-19 related deaths recorded in the past 24 hours, taking the total number of fatalities to date to 61,332.

The NICD said that there were 627 new hospital admissions in the past day, meaning that there are now 13,751 people being treated for Covid-19 in the country’s hospitals.

TimesLIVE