For the last two weeks there appears to be continual cases reported from the current hot spots namely Grahamstown to Port Elizabeth and North of Gauteng particularly Muldersdrift. Many cases have now been reported South of Johannesburg.  In the last 7 days 45 new cases have been reported.

I have noticed that the cases mostly are from the previous three weeks and this could be due to the cold snap we experienced during mid March.

There also seems to be far fewer cases reported during March than expected based on previous years % reports which puts March as having about 60% of the total reports. It also seems that our % of mortalities in increasing this year. 2007 – 52% 2008 - 58%

There is also a lot of media interest this year focusing on the E/Cape outbreak. We welcome the exposure as it forms part of out awareness policy but I caution rash statements to the press about “new strains” and “ineffective vaccine” with out any scientific evidence. So far the E/Cape have three strains identified 6,7 and 9. There is no evidence of a new strain and we can see that a large proportion of the mortalities have no vaccination record.

The State vet from the E/Cape has imposed movement control into, within and out of the province. We welcome this initiative even though it might be a little of closing the door after the horse has bolted.

I have included the overall stats in this mail. If you need to see the specific areas please go the map on our website.