Faizel Patel – 21/06/2021

With South Africa currently in the midst of the third wave of the Coronavirus pandemic, President Cyril Ramaphosa says families, communities, companies and government must do everything possible to limit the impact and toll of the virus.

The president was addressing the nation in his weekly newsletter “From the desk of the President,” on Monday.

Ramaphosa says the COVID-19 infection rate has climbed rapidly over the past few weeks, increasing more than 15-fold from below 800 in early April to over 13,000 in the past week.

Ramaphosa says we all know what we have to do to bring the rate of infection down, and we must act with great discipline to protect our people and our livelihoods.

“Once again, we have to avoid social gatherings of all kinds, whether for family, friends, business or recreation. We must work from home if we can. We must wear masks when other people are around and stay one and half metre from other people whenever possible.”

Ramaphosa adds that we can win the battle against the Coronavirus pandemic, but it will take persistence and discipline.

Ramaphosa says while there are huge differences in cases between different parts of the country, Gauteng is by far the hardest hit.

“Gauteng looks small on the map. But it is home to one in five South Africans and two-fifths of our economy. As an economic hub many people travel to and from this province. We need to turn this around urgently, or lives and livelihoods will be seriously under threat.”

Ramaphosa says the country plans to provide vaccinations for the vast majority of adults in South Africa by the end of the year encouraging those who were eligible, including teachers who could get their jab this week, to do so.

(Twitter: @FaizelPatel143)