Africa’s COVID-19 cases near 970,000

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia

The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases across the African continent reached 968,020 on Tuesday, the Africa Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said.

The Africa CDC, a specialized healthcare agency of the 55-member African Union (AU) Commission, in its latest situation update issued on Tuesday, said that the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases across the continent rose from 957,035 on Monday to 968,020 as of Tuesday.

The Africa CDC report also said that the number of deaths related to the COVID-19 pandemic rose to 20,612 deaths on Tuesday, up from 20,288 on Monday.

The continental disease control and prevention agency further noted that some 629,726 patients who tested positive for COVID-19 have recovered across the continent so far, registering about 18,000 new recoveries as compared to Monday’s 611,957 report.

South Africa is Africa’s highest affected country in terms of positive cases, followed by Egypt, Nigeria, Algeria and Morocco, it was noted.

The Southern Africa region is the most affected area in terms of confirmed cases, followed by Northern Africa and Western Africa regions, respectively, the Africa CDC said.

Amid the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic across the African continent, the Africa CDC disclosed recently that some 34 African countries are under “full border closure” in an effort to halt the spread of the infectious virus.