The health department says it has been assured by the National Health Laboratory Service that there is no shortage of antivenom and manufacturing and deliveries to health facilities are continuing.
Amended lockdown regulations over the Easter weekend saw the number of people who could attend religious and other gatherings more than double to 250 people indoors and 500 outdoors, and, while shebeens and restaurants remained open, the offsite sale of liquor was prohibited for four days.
The apparent lack of a scientific basis for these decisions prompted the South African Liquor Brand Owners Association to release an investigative report it commissioned several months ago.
The investigation set out to interrogate the widely held view that there is a clear causal link between the three alcohol bans (excluding the recent Easter ban) and the visible and, at times, startling decline in hospital trauma admissions that occurred at the same time.
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The festive season is one of the busiest times for trauma units at hospitals all over the country, but the burden is greater this year because of Covid-19, says Professor Timothy Hardcastle, executive member of the We ve all been a lot busier. With the non-trauma stuff, a lot of ICU beds have been cut back to be used for Covid-19 patients, so there s less beds available for trauma patients, says Hardcastle.
Hardcastle says, this festive season, the trauma unit has seen less car accidents than in previous years, but he says there has been an increase in interpersonal violence cases.