30/12/2021
TO ALL MEDIA/NEWS EDITORS
THURSDAY 30 DECEMBER 2021
CABINET APPROVES CHANGES TO COVID-19 REGULATIONS
A special Cabinet meeting held earlier today, 30 December 2021, has approved several changes to the Adjusted Alert Level 1 COVID-19 regulations.
This follows meetings of the National Coronavirus Command Council (NCCC) and the Presidentβs Coordinating Council (PCC), which received updates on the management of the current 4th wave of COVID-19 in South Africa, which is mainly driven by the Omicron variant.
COVID-19 Update
The information gathered through the system used by the Department of Health has reported a 29.7% decrease in the number of new cases detected in the week ending 25 December 2021 (89,781), compared to the number of new cases detected in the previous week (127,753).
All indicators suggest the country may have passed the peak of the fourth wave at a national level.
Cases declined in all provinces except the Western Cape and Eastern Cape, which recorded increases of 14% and 18%, respectively. There has been a decline in hospital admissions in all provinces except the Western Cape.
While the Omicron variant is highly transmissible, there has been lower rates of hospitalisation than in previous waves. This means that the country has a spare capacity for admission of patients even for routine health services. There is a marginal increase in the number of deaths in all the provinces.
Changes to COVID-19 regulations
Based on the trajectory of the pandemic, the levels of vaccination in the country and the available capacity within the health sector, Cabinet has decided to make the following changes to Adjusted Alert Level 1 with immediate effect:
- The curfew will be lifted. There will therefore be no restrictions on the hours of movement of people.
- Gatherings are restricted to no more than 1 000 people indoors and no more than 2 000 people outdoors. Where the venue is too small to accommodate these numbers with a