[imageosurce:here]

As of this morning, as reported by Worldometer, South Africa has 644 438 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 15 265 deaths, 573 003 recoveries, and 56 170 active cases.

It has been a learning curve over the course of the past few months, and we appear to be gaining some ground on treatments, while academic institutions work towards a vaccine.

At the same time, new data, according to Health24, predicts that one-third of South African adults have likely been infected with the virus, with people between the ages of  20 and 40 most likely to have contracted COVID-19, with lower prevalence among those in younger and older age categories.

This is based on data collected by Discovery Health from an actuarial analysis of confirmed infections, recorded deaths, and excess deaths recorded over the course of the pandemic, as well as excess deaths reported by the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC).

Discovery’s extrapolation of this data arrived at a predicted average infection rate of 22% of the population (13,1 million people).

Per BusinessTech, Ryan Noach, CEO of Discovery Health, said at a briefing on Thursday:

…”global research shows that an extraordinary number of Covid-19 cases remain undiagnosed with an estimated rate of asymptomatic cases varying in the literature from 40% in some studies to up to 75%,” says Dr Noach. “We have looked further into these insights.”

The medical health insurer also reckons that the swift action of the national government, when they locked down the country on March 27, saved an estimated 16 000 lives.

“There is no doubt that our early-onset lockdown delayed the country’s Covid-19 peak, gave us time to learn from globally-emergent treatment advances and availed capacity within our healthcare system to deal with the pandemic.”

However, he says, the positive reflection on the epidemiological and clinical aspects of the lockdown “does not in any way detract from the very challenging economic impacts of the lockdown”.

According to Business Insider, when the pandemic began, 80% of ICU patients with COVID-19 lost their lives to the disease, dropping to 60% by July and August, as reflected in the graph below:

Image: Discovery

This improvement in mortality rates through treatments discovered during the lockdown means that 10 000 lives have been saved thus far, with an estimated 6 000 lives saved by the end of the year.

“It is unequivocal that lockdown saved lives in respect of Covid-19,” says Noach. “We have achieved lower infection fatality rates when compared with other countries globally. The primary aim of our national lockdown – to save lives – has been achieved.”

Still, this isn’t the time to rest on our laurels. The lives saved are not only the product of government action.

The wearing of masks and cooperation from South African citizens played a major role in preventing infection, especially if we factor in that a large percentage of the population may have been infected without realising it.

The same applies now. We are by no means in the clear.

If it’s possible to have COVID-19 without connecting the dots and going for a test, then you could be walking around unknowingly carrying the disease, and therefore able to infect others.

So keep up the PPE, so that we can keep lowering that infection and mortality rate.

[sources:health24&businessinsider&businesstech]