Alex van den Heever: We have not ‘flattened the curve’ and our current trajectory is very concerning

South Africa’s Covid-19 pandemic trajectory is far from clear. While the lockdown initially impacted on the trajectory, the effects were predictably limited. The initial decline in the reproduction rate R was largely attributable to the suppression of the pandemic in the affluent communities.

It went from around 2.2. before the lockdown (one infected person infects 2.2 people over a period of four days) to 0.7. This lasted for a mere 12 days before we shifted to around 1.1 to 1.2. Unfortunately, due to inadequate screening and testing in all the provinces, except the Western Cape, the reported infections are unlikely to be a true reflection of what is actually happening.

The new numbers driving the trajectory are almost exclusively driven by the Western Cape, which is erroneously described as the epicentre of the epidemic. An epicentre is the centre-point of an outbreak, not the largest detected outbreak…..more