Mkhize confirms talks over revised lockdown regulations
Health Minister, Zweli Mkhize has confirmed growing speculation about talks of revised lockdown regulations.
Expectations are mounting across the country that President Cyril Ramaphosa could announce the further lowering of the lockdown to level 2, but there’s been no official word from the Presidency.
On Friday, Mkhize told the World Health Organisation (WHO) consultations are underway.
“We are only now considering some of the potential areas of easing of restrictions and that is under discussion at the moment,” said Mkhize.
“When that happens, we very well expect that there will be an up surge. We moved from about 30 000 to 40 000 and when we got into level 3 that’s when we moved up about 400 000 cases within about a period of about two and a half months.”
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This comes a day before the expiry of the one-month extension of the Declaration, which expires at midnight on 15 August 2020. The Disaster Management Act was invoked for the first time on the 27th of March due to the outbreak of Covid-19. This led to the Declaration coming into effect and leading to lockdown.
Mkhize maintains government’s commitment to striking a balance between saving lives and recovering the country’s ailing economy.
“We do understand that there is a need for us to balance the lives and the livelihoods and we actually have to help the communities to get back to normality but at the same time we do know that when we ease the restrictions so will the rate of transmission increase,” he adds.
Government is also tipped to be reconsidering the bans on alcohol and tobacco.
Mkhize remains mum on the deliberations with the government’s Covid-19 response teams.
Listen to Zweli Mkhize below:
