Another Covid-19 record as more than 6,500 cases are confirmed in 24 hours

Another Covid-19 record was broken on Thursday, as 6,580 new cases of the respiratory illness were reported in the past 24 hours.

This shattered the previous day's high of 5,688 cases. It means that there are now 118,375 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in SA.

It is also the first time that more than 40,000 tests were done in a single 24-hour period.

The health ministry also announced 87 Covid-19 related deaths in the past 24 hours, taking the total to 2,292.

Of the deaths, 53 were in the Western Cape, 17 from the Eastern Cape, 15 from KwaZulu-Natal and two from Gauteng.

There were also a record number of recoveries (3,100), bringing the total to 59,974. This means that more than half of those who contracted the illness in SA had since recovered

The Western Cape continues to have the significantly highest number of cases (56,780), followed by Gauteng (28,746), the Eastern Cape (20,487) and KwaZulu-Natal (6,590).

The number of cases in the North West also continued its rapid climb, reaching 2,965 cases by Thursday.

The figures were based on a national total of 1,460,012 tests, of which 43,118 were done in the past 24 hours.