Cape Town - Health Minister Joe Phaahla has warned that they would not recommend the lowering of restrictions to the National Coronavirus Command Council as the numbers have not stabilised yet.
He said on Friday, that there was no time for South Africa to lower its guard against the pandemic.
He said they should continue to intensify to fight the spread of the virus by using non-pharmaceutical interventions and the vaccination programme.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has said they will continue to review the situation every two weeks.
“The Department of Health will in no way recommend to the National Coronavirus Command Council to lower the restrictions. The department will recommend remaining at level 3,” Phaahla said Phaahla.
He said they were happy that 9.1 million people have been vaccinated so far.
He said the deaths remain high in the country and they want to bring down these numbers.
The fight against Covid-19 was not yet over.
People should continue to stick to non-pharmaceutical interventions to fight the spread of the virus.
He said the positivity rate has gone down in the country, but it was still far from the recommendation of the World Health Organisation. The positivity rate has gone down from 35% to 19%. But this was short of the WHO recommendation of 5%.
This was not the time for the country to let its guard down against the virus.
Political Bureau