BREAKING: Family meeting! Ramaphosa to address the nation tonight

After meeting with the National Coronavirus Command Council this weekend, the presidency has confirmed that there will be a family meeting tonight. President Cyril Ramaphosa will address the nation live at 8PM (Sunday).

Family meeting: Will Ramaphosa announce a lockdown?

Ramaphosa’s address will be broadcast live at 8PM on The South African, as well as all news channels. Several radio stations will also take the president’s speech live.

Ramaphosa was originally set to meet his Coronavirus Command Council on Sunday. But due to the global panic around the Omicron variant, the meeting took place on Saturday instead. Throughout the second half of the week, South Africa has been red-listed by several countries for international travel.

With SA having reported over 3000 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, government could well look at reducing the size of gatherings.

Over 80% of the new cases are from Gauteng. This means that interprovincial travel for leisure in and out of the province could make a return too.

New documentation from the Department of Health reveals certain adults are set to be eligible for vaccine booster shots from December.

There have also been new calls for vaccine mandates from Business groups. One even went as far as to demand that South Africans can not travel by taxi, unless vaccinated.

Will Cyril weigh in on the controversial topic?

WHAT IS THE OMICRON VARIANT?

On Friday, the World Health organisation’s Technical Advisory Group on all things COVID-19 met. They met for the sole purpose of assessing the B.1.1.529 variant.

By the end of that meeting, the WHO had named the variant the omicron variant. This follows the Delta and Beta variants that were also given Greek names.

The first case of the Omicron variant was from a COVID test that was collected on the 9th of November. South African scientists identified the new variant and first reported the matter to the WHO on the 24th of November.

Rumours of Ramaphosa calling a family meeting to address the nation have circled since the news went public.

But what makes Omicron different from other variants? Well, it has a large number of mutations. In fact, a lot more than any of the previous variants seen before.

Omicron latest: Top SA scientist warns against another alcohol ban

And based on the science so far, the evidence suggests that there is an increased risk of infection with this particular variant. As a result, the WHO has labelled it a “variant of concern” or VOC.

Be sure you follow Ramaphosa’s family meeting to see his take on it all.