According to statistics released by the department on Tuesday evening, the central South African region recorded two Coronavirus recoveries out of the latest 88 recoveries captured nationwide. Since the onset of the pandemic, 77,06% of prisoners and correctional officials have recovered from Covid-19. The North West, Mpumalanga and Limpopo region reported 19 recoveries out of the latest 88, and has a higher recovery rate than the Free State and Northern Cape region overall. There are now 1189 active cases in the department nationwide.

Previously the OFM News team reported the COVID-19 pandemic has shifted the attention to an age-old problem facing South African communities and prisons in particular - Tuberculosis (TB).  Justice and Correctional Services Minister, Ronald Lamola, has in his written response to a question posed by DA Member of Parliament (MP), Werner Horn, on the Parliamentary Monitoring Group website in early June revealed there are 683 cases of Tuberculosis alone in the country’s prisons, 41% of which are HIV positive as well. The picture painted by the statistics is one that indicates that while transmissions may continue to persist in overcrowded prisons, there have been some strides made, as it is not as rampant as alleged. HIV and TB are inextricably linked, and persistence thereof has increased the call for vulnerable prisoners to be released from overcrowded prisons during the coronavirus pandemic.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) indicates that people living with HIV who have a low CD4 count are much more susceptible to active TB infection than those who don’t. Thus far, Lamola’s statistics indicate that overall, 22 271 prisoners in the country are HIV positive. A tiny portion of these prisoners, 278 to be exact, have been diagnosed with TB as well.

The Western Cape Health Department has released a presentation by Public Health Medicine Specialist and University of Cape Town (UCT) Professor, Mary-Ann Davies, on the risk people with chronic conditions have of dying from Covid-19. Her research based on the Western Cape’s cases indicates people with HIV and TB are less likely to die from the coronavirus than those with diabetes and high blood pressure.

OFM News