Photo: Unsplash
Photo: Unsplash
It has been a perplexing four months or so for South Africa. After heading into lockdown earlier than many other countries, the government received global acclaim for their swift reaction to the COVID-19 crisis. Sadly, that goodwill has all but evaporated, as the deadly disease continues to rip through the population.
What’s gone wrong for South Africa?
Irrational laws, mixed messaging, and a host of unacceptable behaviours from our ministers have somewhat soured the public buy-in. Drinkers and smokers were alienated almost immediately, and under current policies, citizens cannot visit their friends and family at home – yet they could all go and meet up in a casino.
South Africa started very, very well. Even POTUS sent his congratulations to Cyril Ramaphosa. The peak has been pushed back to the end of this month and August, but there are shortcomings. Testing capabilities have been questioned, and many hospitals – including those in the Eastern Cape – are struggling to accommodate patients.
The rhetoric has changed: President Ramaphosa says South Africa is now ‘in a war’, and people ‘must accept’ their rights will be restricted. The togetherness that was harnessed back in March has manifested itself into something more regimented. With another 12 000 cases and more than 200 deaths recorded on Thursday, our nation now finds itself amongst the worst-hit countries in the world.
COVID-19: The worst-affected countries in the world
Following the last 24-hour period, South Africa now sits at sixth in terms of countries with the highest COVID-19 cases. Yesterday, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma revealed that we’re also fourth-highest in terms of ‘new infections’. Mzansi is now a reluctant world-beater, surpassing some of the worst-hit countries on Earth…
? ? COVID19 TOP 25 WORLD STATISTIC UPDATED INFOS 16/07/2020 – USA, Brazil and India still grow at a infernal rate. South Africa overcome Chile in sixth in the world by number of cases and Mexico ranks fourth in the world in terms of death toll. pic.twitter.com/CXG50whayP
— Luca Vittorio (@lvvconsulting) July 17, 2020
South Africa now has 324 221 cases. Since the end of June, it has overtaken the following nations:
Mexico – 324 041 cases: The country, reporting over 37 000 deaths, is currently experiencing its virus peak.
Chile – 323 698 cases: SA also surpassed the South American country’s total on Thursday night.
Spain – 305 953 cases: One of the first regions to experience a mass outbreak, Spain was ravaged by COVID-19.
The United Kingdom – 292 552 cases: A generally mishandled response saw over 1 000 people per day dying from this disease in April, in a country which has the third-highest amount of coronavirus fatalities.
Iran – 267 061 cases: Was initially one of the ‘front-runners’ in terms COVID-19 deaths.
Italy – 243 736 cases: Experienced the true horror of the peak in March, showing the world how devastating this disease could be.
France – 173 838 cases: Another European superpower that was brought to its knees, while SA was reporting low transmission numbers.
China – 83 622 cases: Although this record has been surpassed for some time, China was the epicentre of the virus. Now, South Africa has nearly four times as many cases as the Far East superpower.
- (Data taken from Worldometer and John Hopkins University)
