How world sees SA: Cape Town super-spreaders on global Covid-19 hotspot map

The world is watching Covid-19 developments in Cape Town, which stands out as having a much higher rate of transmission than anywhere else in Africa. The Washington Post has produced an in-depth feature, telling its readers that South Africa's strict lockdown has had the opposite of its intended effect in the Mother City, driving individuals to contaminated supermarkets after local shops were ordered to close. President Cyril Ramaphosa announced last week that by the end of May the government will transition its lockdown to a tiered approach, in which areas with hot spots will have more restrictions than those without. Schools reopen from June. But the forecast is for a spike in cases as the country heads into winter. – Jackie Cameron

By Thulasizwe Sithole

Cape Town is best-known internationally as a tourism hotspot – but now it has earned a reputation as being Africa's Covid-19 hotspot. That's the message in the Washington Post, which notes that the city accounts for 60% of cases in South Africa, 15% in sub-Saharan Africa and 10% of Africa's as a whole.

"South African epidemiologists are looking to the city — with more than 9,300 cases as of Tuesday — to provide insight into how the virus is spreading on a continent that has largely escaped the waves of death seen in Western Europe and the United States," say WP reporters.

The early answer, officials and experts say, is two-pronged. First, the city welcomed more tourists from hard-hit regions of the world than did other places in Africa, meaning the coronavirus was widely seeded here early. Second, major hotspots emerged in two supermarkets and a pharmaceutical factory that supercharged the virus's spread.

___STEADY_PAYWALL___