South Africa has become the first country on the continent to register more than one million covid-19 cases.
It comes just days after authorities confirmed that a new, faster-spreading, Coronavirus variant had been detected.
Some hospitals and medical centres have reported a huge rise in admissions, putting a heavy strain on resources.
The grim milestone was announced on Sunday by South Africa’s health minister, Zweli Mkhize.
The country has now confirmed one million, four thousand and 413 covid-19 infections and 26,735 deaths since the outbreak began in march.
Last week, South Africa recorded a daily average of 11,700 new infections – a rise of 39% from the previous week – and from Wednesday to Friday the daily number of new cases was above 14,000.
After South Africa, the worst hit country on the African continent is Morocco which has seen 432,079 cases and 7,240 deaths. They are followed by Egypt with 131,315 cases and 7,352 deaths and Tunisia with 130,230 infections and 4,426 deaths.
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