What the data says: 98% of over 60s who died were not vaccinated

Stats from a seven-day period in the Western Cape have shown how the unvaccinated are putting themselves at major risk of death.

According to data presented by Dr Saadiq Kariem, chief of operations in the Western Cape department of health, 98.3% of deaths in those over 60 were among the unvaccinated.

Covid-19 hospital admissions in that age group were 96% unvaccinated and only 4% vaccinated. Of the overall cases in that age group, 92% were among the unvaccinated.

He said 38% of those eligible in the province had been vaccinated, and that the province is still seeing 65 Covid-19 deaths and 1,505 infections per day.

This is compared to 122 deaths and 3,543 infections per day at the peak.

The province will only have exited the third wave when the daily infections drop to 530. According to the modelling, there is only a 20% probability of the province exiting the third wave by September 18.

“Only Limpopo and Gauteng have technically exited the third wave,” said Kariem. “Others remain in it, and we have actually seen increases in the Eastern Cape, Northern Cape and Free State.”

Premier Alan Winde said while the province was still in the third peak, “the numbers are coming down daily” and vaccine coverage has been high in some areas.

In Overberg it was at 98%, on the West Coast over 80% and in Klipfontein 78%.

Two large communities still ignoring the stats are Mitchells Plain and Khayelitsha, which have 43% and 47% coverage respectively.

Kariem said in some cases, “crazy conspiracy theories abounded” in those two areas, adding that the contagious spread of “misinformation” was impacting on people’s ability to make a decision based on the stats, which show the drop in infections, hospital admissions and death among the vaccinated.

Western Cape health MEC Nomafrench Mbombo, who attended vaccination of the homeless at the Methodist Church in Sea Point on Thursday, said “nobody should be left behind” and the only hope of “saving the summer” was to curb the spread of misinformation and get people jabbed.

TimesLIVE