Mail & Guardian
Mail & Guardian
Charma du Plessis

Creator

Charma du Plessis

Ambassadors from Kenya, Ghana, Liberia and Tanzania this week discussed how to improve climate literacy among Africa’s youth and announced the launch of a toolkit for the campaign. (Reuters)
CLIMATE

Environmentalists launch tool kit to teach Africa’s youth about climate change

The environmental group Earthday.org has been campaigning to improve climate literacy and wants to make the subject compulsory at schools

  • Charma du Plessis
1 min read
The priority for Africa is to achieve herd immunity for Covid-19, the head of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said at a weekly briefing on Thursday. ( Photo by Vincent Kalut / Photonews via Getty Images)
AFRICA CDC

Africa CDC prioritises full vaccination over Pfizer booster

The continent’s public health agency said the latest figures showed that 6.5-million cases of Covid-19 had been reported in Africa, out of which some 867 000 people had died

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
AFROBAROMETER

Do South Africans prefer prayer to vaccines?

According to an Afrobarometer survey of 1 600 people, the majority of people do not trust the government to deliver safe vaccines

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
AFRICA CDC

Africa partners with the US and Europe to reach vaccination goals

Avat has secured a donation of several hundred million doses of Covid-19 drugs from the United States, 25-million of which will begin to be rolled out by the end of this week

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
Last week’s looting and violence, which rocked KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, could cause a spike in post-traumatic stress disorder cases among children and adolescents (Photo by MARCO LONGARI / AFP)
ANUSHA LACHMA

Riots and looting could cause PTSD among children

The South African Society of Psychiatrists has warned that children and adolescents are vulnerable to post-traumatic stress disorder

  • Charma du Plessis
3 min read
Hundreds of South African members of the non-governmental organisation Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) protest outside the Life Esidimeni arbitration public hearing on January 22, 2018 in Johannesburg, South Africa. At least 143 mentally ill patients died after South African authorities moved them in 2016 from hospital to unlicensed health facilities that were compared to “concentration camps”, a government investigation revealed on January 17, 2018. Many of the deaths were due to pneumonia, dehydration and diarrhoea, as the patients were hurriedly shifted to 27 “poorly-prepared” facilities in an apparent cost-cutting measure that showed evidence of neglect. / AFP PHOTO / GIANLUIGI GUERCIA (Photo credit should read GIANLUIGI GUERCIA/AFP via Getty Images)
ADILA HASSIM

Poor government decisions caused Life Esidimeni deaths, inquest hears

Health officials pushed ahead with transferring patients to ill-equipped NGO facilities despite several warnings

  • Chris Gilili
  • Charma du Plessis
3 min read
FD1-FD5 volunteers at Jacaranda Montessori preschool packaging and loading donations into trucks to transport to KwaZulu-Natal. (Humairah Rangila)
ZUMAUNREST

Food drives from Jo’burg support KwaZulu-Natal’s citizens in need

Various charities and private groups are organising drives to provide necessities such as food, toiletries and medicine in areas heavily affected by looting

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
Forty-four Covid-19 vaccination sites have managed to remain operational in KwaZulu-Natal despite the upheaval sparked by protests. (Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
ZUMAUNREST

Violence severely impedes Covid-19 vaccine rollout in KwaZulu-Natal, Gauteng

Twenty pharmacies in KZN have been looted and damaged, while one was burned down and several others closed their doors as a precaution

  • Charma du Plessis
3 min read
The MTBPS stresses that there are already 18.3 million citizens who receive one or another form of welfare grant. (Delwyn Verasamy/M&G)
ZUMAUNREST

Sassa payments at cash paypoints suspended due to riots

Sassa has suspended cash payments after the cash-in-transit industry halted cash delivery until further notice in response to rioting and looting

  • Charma du Plessis
1 min read
If ivermectin had dramatic results in combating Covid-19, it should perform well in any well-conducted, unbiased scientific study, but this is not the case. (Delwyn Verasamy/M&G)
COVID 19

People use social media posts to sell Ivermectin on the black market

Selling medication without a license to prescribe or dispense it is illegal, and can lead to a hefty fine or imprisonment

  • Charma du Plessis
3 min read
South Africa’s first paediatric vaccine trial participant received the first shot of the Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine (Photo by Darren Stewart/Gallo Images via Getty Images)
BETA VARIANT

Vaccination rate ramps up and registration for people aged 35 to 49 to open

More than 191 000 people were vaccinated on Thursday the daily target for next week is 250 00, says the health department

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
Up to one in five people can get long COVID — a condition in which someone keeps on feeling ill for months after their initial symptoms have cleared up. (Paul Botes)
COVID 19

Covid-19 infections soar as 15 African countries now grapple with Delta variant

South Africa makes up 37% of the continent’s virus caseload, with more than two-million infections

  • Charma du Plessis
3 min read
All teachers, including those with comorbidities, are expected to return to work when schools reopen, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said on Wednesday. (Paul Botes/M&G)
ANGIE MOTSHEKGA

It’s back to school for the 16 000 teachers on special leave for comorbidities

People at early childhood development are still fighting to get Covid-19 vaccinations

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
While Pride Month is commemorated at different times across South Africa, the month of June carries particular significance as the original Pride Month in the Northern Hemisphere. File Photo
CONVERSION THERAPY

Children’s conversion therapy up for discussion in new bill

Conversion therapy in LGBTQIA+ children is discrimination on the basis of gender and sexuality under the constitution of South Africa; yet it is still not prohibited under the…

  • Charma du Plessis
2 min read
ALCOHOL BAN

The social development department is discussing vaccinating ECD, Sassa workers in current phase

Minister Lindiwe Zulu made wide-ranging announcements on Friday, including how early childhood development centres should operate under level-four lockdown

  • Charma du Plessis
3 min read