South Africa's daily Covid cases soar to another five-month high

2021-12-09

South Africa’s daily Covid cases soar to another five-month high and hospital admissions shoot up 65% in a week as Omicron wave engulfs country

Omicron-stricken South Africa today posted another 22,391 Covid infections, almost double last week’s tally
Hospitalisations ticked up another 65 per cent in a week, but deaths fell by half on the previous period
Covid cases now appear to be levelling off in epicentre Gauteng, with scientists have tentatively welcomed

Omicron-stricken South Africa’s daily Covid cases soared to another five-month high today, official figures showed — but data suggests infections in the country’s ground ‘zero’ may now be flattening.

Nationally 22,391 cases were detected in the past 24 hours almost double the tally on the previous Thursday, the country’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases said.

Daily hospitalisations have shot up 65 per cent in a week with 453 people admitted to wards, but doctors on the frontlines insist that it is only causing mild disease.

Analysis of hospitalisation rates shows 60 per cent fewer patients are being moved to ICU and 70 per cent fewer are being put on ventilators than at this point during the Delta wave.

And in another promising sign, daily Covid deaths in the country fell by half in a week with another 22 recorded. However, fatalities are the biggest lagging indicator and can take a month before they start mirroring rises in cases.

Covid cases appear to be levelling off in Omicron ground ‘zero’ Gauteng, where infections rose by 43 per cent in a week today — the smallest increase in a month.

British experts have hailed the signal as ‘tentative good news’, and said the outbreak there may now be beginning to level off earlier than previously expected.

But it is not clear whether this is down to a lack of testing in the area, with the positivity rate — the proportion of tests that pick up the virus — in South Africa still high at 29.8 per cent suggesting many cases are missed. The World Health Organization says this should not get above five per cent.

Boris Johnson yesterday announced England would enter Plan B rules from next week, after experts warned the variant would cause a million cases and 1,000 daily hospital admissions by New Year if left unchecked.

But MailOnline analysis of hospital rates in South Africa suggests Omicron is causing less severe illness than its predecessors. The variant has caused 60 per cent fewer hospitalised patients going to intensive care in Gauteng compared to Delta.

WHO officials say ‘the number of admissions is very low’ in South Africa compared to those seen during the Delta wave — despite infections being higher than with the previous strain.

But even if the strain does cause milder disease, if infections balloon to too high a level, hospitalisations will soon follow.

South Africa’s daily Covid cases have hit their highest level in five months again today, amid the rampant spread of the Omicron varaint

Cases have surged in Gauteng at the epicentre, but they are now also rising quickly in KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape

Covid cases appear to have already peaked in the in the South African province at the epicentre of the Omicron outbreak, figures suggest. Graph shows: Gauteng’s daily cases (red line), average cases (blue line) compared to the predicted 25 per cent daily rise cases had been following since November 15

The NICD publishes daily updates on Covid cases, hospitalisations and deaths detected in the country.

Its latest figures show that infections are still more than quadrupling week-on-week in three of the country’s nine provinces — KwaZulu-Natal, Free State and Eastern Cape.

Cases more than doubled in the other five — Limpopo, North West, Mpumalanga, Northern Cape and Western Cape — while the epicentre Gauteng saw the lowest increase in its cases in the country.

Early data indicates the Omicron Covid variant may cause milder disease than previous variants but could also more easily reinfect people who have already had the virus or been vaccinated than previous variants, the WHO said Wednesday.

‘Emerging data from South Africa suggests increased risk of reinfection with Omicron,’ World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters, adding that ‘there is also some evidence that Omicron causes milder disease than Delta’.

But he stressed that more data was needed before drawing firm conclusions, and urged countries everywhere to boost their surveillance to help provide a clearer picture of how Omicron is behaving.

The hopeful assessments came as global concern grew over the heavily mutated variant, which has forced dozens of nations to re-impose border restrictions and raised the possibility of a return to economically punishing lockdowns.

Even if it does turn out that Omicron causes less severe disease, Tedros warned against slacking off vigilance against the virus.

‘Any complacency now will cost lives,’ he warned.

WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan agreed, pointing out that so far the data indicates the variant is ‘efficiently transmitting, and probably more efficiently transmitting even than the Delta variant.’

‘That does not mean that the virus is unstoppable,’ he said.

‘But it means the virus is more efficient at transmitting between human beings. And therefore we have to redouble our efforts to break those chains of transmission to protect ourselves to protect others.’

Even if the new variant turns out to be less dangerous than previous variants, if it transmits more rapidly, it could still sicken more people, overburden health systems, ‘and more people die,’ he said.

The WHO experts stressed the importance of vaccination, highlighting that even if vaccines prove less effective against Omicron, as some data indicates, they are still expected to provide significant protection against severe disease.

Chief WHO scientist Soumya Swaminathan cautioned against knee-jerk reactions to early studies hinting that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine may have reduced efficacy against the new variant.

She pointed out that the studies done so far were small and that the reduction in the ‘neutralising activity’ varied dramatically between different studies, from four to five fold in some experiments to up to 40-fold in others.

They also only looked at the neutralisation of antibodies, when ‘we know the immune system is much more complex than that,’ she said.

‘So I think it’s premature to conclude that this reduction neutralising activity would result in a significant reduction in vaccine effectiveness,’ she said. ‘We do not know that.’

Independent SAGE member and mathematician Professor Christina Pagel has said the data suggests Gauteng’s outbreak may be levelling off a month after it began.

She wrote on social media: ‘There is some tentative good news out of Gauteng this week, suggesting that cases might be reaching a peak there.’

But she added that this could be down to testing in the country, with many cases possibly being missed because not enough swabs are available.

Infections were increasing on average at around 25 per cent per day since the middle of the month, she said, which would have taken them to around 19,000 by now.

But the Gauteng data show there were 11,791 new cases in the region yesterday, with daily infections below the growth trend for the last four days.

On average, there are now around 9,645 infections per day in the area, up from 3,801 last week.

In Gauteng officials upped the number of tests given out from 89,020 in the week to November 27, to 167,321 in the week to December 4, the latest available.

During that period, positivity — the proportion of tests that came back positive — increased from 16.3 per cent to 35 per cent.

Positivity figures are not yet available for the days in which the recent trend in cases was highlighted, so it is not possible to determine whether real infections may be still be increasing exponentially even if positive tests are not.

Meanwhile, Mr Johnson activated his Covid contingency plan in England last night in response to fears the highly-mutated strain may cause a million infections by New Year and trigger 1,000 daily NHS admissions if left to spread unchecked.

The Prime Minister faced fury from Tory MPs over the anti-Omicron measures, which were described as ‘non-sensical’.

Millions of office staff will be urged to work from home from Monday, while masks will be required in theatres and cinemas, and Covid passports are being introduced for nightclubs and large venues. But the PM stressed that office Christmas parties should go ahead, sparking derision from critics.

The decision to bring in the restrictions came after Sage warned the variant’s vaccine escape and mutations make it much more virulent than any variant before, with infections doubling every two days compared to Delta’s seven.

Even if the strain causes milder disease than its predecessors, it could trigger a hospital spike as large as previous waves because of the sheer number of people who could become infected.

The WHO said preliminary data in South Africa points to Omicron causing less hospitalisations and severe disease than its predecessors.

Speaking at a press briefing today, WHO Africa operational partnerships manager Dr Thierno Balde said: ‘Over the past seven days we are seeing a major increase in cases, almost 250 per cent increase.

‘We are also seeing a 12 per cent increase in hospitalisation over the last 24 hours.

‘But when we compare the situation with Omicron to Delta, the number of admissions is very low but it is important to remember we are at the start of the wave so we need more time to see.’

He added: ‘We are monitoring the situation on a daily basis.

‘In terms of the situation now, yes, we are seeing an increase in hospitalisation, but we cannot say that the situation is causing tension on the hospitals.

‘There are six per cent of ICU beds occupied by Covid patients, so there is still a large capacity left to look after patients — which may be needed in coming weeks or it may not.’

And yesterday WHO director general Tedros Adhanom said: ‘Emerging data from South Africa suggests increased risk of reinfection with Omicron.

‘There is also some evidence that Omicron causes milder disease than Delta.’

The above graphs compare cases (left), Covid hospitalisations (centre) and ICU admissions (right) during the Omicron (red) and Delta (blue) waves. The start date for both waves was set as when South Africa announced its first case of each variant. Although the number of Covid hospitalisations (centre) is similar during both waves doctors on South Africa’s frontlines have said there are far fewer patients needing ICU admissions and ventilators than at the same point in the Delta wave. This is backed up by official data (left) which shows the number of ICU admissions is currently at a third of the level it was during the Delta wave

The proportion of Covid patients hospitalised in Gauteng, South Africa’s Omicron epicentre, is shown during the Omicron (left) and Delta (right) waves. The start of each wave was marked as when South Africa announced its first case of the variant. Figures show that at present the ICU admission rate for Covid patients is just a third of the level seen at the same point during the Delta wave. Experts say this may suggest that the mutant strain is less severe than first feared

The above shows the proportion of hospitalised Covid patients on ventilators during the Omicron (left) and Delta (right) waves. It reveals that levels are currently at a third of what they were when Delta took hold as well. The start date for both waves was set as when South Africa announced its first case of each mutant strain in the country

But he stressed that more data was needed before drawing firm conclusions, and urged countries everywhere to boost their surveillance to help provide a clearer picture of how Omicron is behaving.

Even if it does turn out that Omicron causes less severe disease, Tedros warned against slacking off vigilance against the virus. ‘Any complacency now will cost lives,’ he warned.

MailOnline analysis yesterday showed Omicron is causing less hospital admissions than Delta did at a comparable point after both variants were first detected in South Africa.

In Gauteng, 139 Covid patients in hospital were being cared for in intensive care wards on Monday, about two weeks into the nation’s latest wave. This was the equivalent to 8 per cent of all infected patients who were admitted for treatment.

For comparison, there were 393 infected patients in ICUs in the two weeks after Delta took off in the province, or 24 per cent.

NICD figures showed that in the latest week — roughly a fortnight after the strain was first detected — there were 1,371 Covid-infected patients in the province’s hospitals every day, on average.

Some 103 of these were in intensive care facilities (eight per cent), and 30 were hooked up to ventilators (two per cent).

For comparison, in the second week of the Delta wave there were 1,578 patients in hospital every day with 380 in the ICU (24 per cent) and 153 on ventilators (10 per cent).

Overall hospital admissions in the province are tracking at the same speed now as during the Delta wave.

But a much lower proportion involve serious disease where patients need to be treated in the ICU or hooked up to a ventilator.

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