Faizel Patel – 23/12/2020
The former manager and doctor of the Protea’s Cricket team and Lenasia doctor Mohammed Moosajee says while it is very early to tell, experts believe that preliminary data may suggest that the new variant of COVID-19 may be more virulent, transmissible and more infectious for younger people.
Dr Moosajee was speaking to Radio Islam on Tuesday, following the announcement by Health Minister Dr. Zweli Mkhize last week that South African scientists have identified a variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Last week, the chairperson of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on COVID-19, Professor Salim Abdool Karim said the new variant of the Coronavirus in the second wave is spreading faster in South Africa than the first wave.
Dr Moosajee says there has been a rapid increase in the number of infections in Lenasia and surrounds after he and his brother Dr Ibrahim consulted a number of patients.
“I can safely say, if we go back ten days before today and a month or six weeks before that, there was probably no cases that was seen at our practice. But in the last ten days, we’ve seen an access of about fifty positive cases and we’ve had about six to eight hospital admissions. So there is no doubt that in the last two weeks or so there has been a spike in the community.”
Dr. Moosajee says there are various reasons for the spike in infections.
“I think one of the most important things is that there’s just a general feeling of COVID fatigue and apathy because it is very tough for people and we understand that. But at the same time, we must understand it’s some of those functions in our community that allowed for this to spiral out of control. If you’ve got symptoms and feeling, there is no reason you should be going to a public forum because the risk of spreading is just too much at the moment.”
He says the December festive period also may result in a spike in infections.
“The challenge we are going to have right now is the more social functions you have, people that gather in places, I’ve got no doubt that come January we going to be having another issue to deal with which is probably the December rush that has caused the number of cases to spike.”
Dr Moosajee says it possible that a person can be infected a second time with the Coronavirus after consulting with two patients in the past week who tested positive for the virus after being infected with COVID-19 before.
Listen to the interview with Dr Mohammed Moosajee
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