"We wish to assure the South African public that they are in safe hands at a Netcare Group facility during the outbreak of the virus," group chief executive officer Dr Richard Friedland said in a statement.

"Credible health information is a powerful means of prevention, and we will do our utmost to help equip the public with important COVID-19 information at this time.”

Health minister Zweli Mkhize said on Thursday a 38-year-old man from KwaZulu-Natal had become South Africa's first confirmed case of the disease, which is spreading across the globe after first being detected in China last December.

Netcare said it had formed a multi-disciplinary task team as soon as the outbreak of the new coronavirus in China was made public early in January. The company had since implemented comprehensive precautionary measures to ensure that all group operations were fully prepared to respond to, and manage, any cases of COVID-19.

"We have closely cooperated with the National Institute for Communicable Diseases and the department of health on an ongoing basis, and have aligned our clinical protocols for managing COVID-19 patients with their clinical guidelines," Friedland said.

All people entering Netcare facilities were being verbally screened for COVID-19 risk at the main points of entry as the first line of defense, with further screening done where indicated, he said.

The group was also deploying ultraviolet light disinfection robots in those of its hospitals that did not yet have the devices, which had been proven to be extremely effective in identifying and destroying viruses, bacteria and fungal spores.

Netcare was also daily screening all staff, including personnel of external service providers in all areas of the business, added Friedland.

The KZN man confirmed to have COVID-19 arrived in Johannesburg from a holiday trip to Italy on March 1, but only developed symptoms two days later, health minister Mkhize said on Thursday, adding that the patient was now receiving treatment in an undisclosed public hospital.

The latest situational update from the World Health Organisation, dated Thursday, says there are now 95,333 confirmed cases of COVID-19,  80,565 of them in China. Some 14,768 cases have been confirmed in 85 other countries. The death toll stands at 3,015 in China and 267 elsewhere.

African News Agency (ANA)