Six new cases of Covid-19 have been confirmed in South Africa, taking the number of cases up to 13, the Minister of Health, Zweli Mkhize, announced in a statement on Wednesday morning.

This takes the total number of Covid-19 positive individuals in South Africa to 13. To date, 645 tests have been conducted.

According to the statement, four of the new cases are in Gauteng, one in KwaZulu-Natal and one in the Western Cape.

All of the patients had recently travelled to Europe.

The new Gauteng cases are a woman, 33, who returned from Italy on 1 March, a couple, aged 34 and 33, who returned from Germany on 9 March, and a 57-year old man who had travelled to Austria and Italy and returned on 9 March, 2020.

In KwaZulu-Natal a 40-year-old man who had travelled to Portugal tested positive for Covid-19 on his return to South Africa on 7 March. 

The individual in the Western Cape is a 36-year-old man who had travelled to multiple countries including Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Turkey. He returned to South Africa on 9 March 2020.

According to the statement some of the patients are symptomatic and have started treatment while those who are non-symptomatic are in self-quarantine.

“Contact tracing has also started for all these cases,” the statement reads.

The other cases so far diagnosed in South Africa are a 38-year-old man in KwaZulu-Natal who was the first case to test positive, on 3 March. His wife also contracted the virus. Next a 30-year-old woman in Gauteng tested positive for the virus. Two other individuals tested positive in KwaZulu-Natal but are asymptomatic, and another man, 38, who tested positive for the virus, showed mild symptoms. They were all part of a group who travelled to Italy. DM