- President Cyril Ramaphosa further relaxed Covid-19 restrictions under Alert Level 1.
- South Africans, for example, will no longer be required to wear a mask outdoors.
- There have been 3.7 million Covid cases recorded in South Africa since the start of the pandemic.
On Tuesday, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the further easing of Covid-19 restrictions, but the National State of Disaster was extended yet again until mid-April.
The public had been given 30 days to comment on the new health regulations, published on 15 March. But some scientists described them as illogical.
This week, on The Story, co-hosts Catherine Rice and Amy Gibbings talk to News24 journalists Marvin Charles and Jason Felix about the new Covid-19 regulations, how they'll impact you, and why they're being criticised.
Charles said the DA was calling for an end to the National State of Disaster as "there is a need for some kind of balance" as it gave the government the power to "make rules as they go along".
Felix said the government needed to focus on economic recovery and vaccinating more people in the 18 to 35 age group.
"We can't recover with the state of disaster in place."
The DA recently launched a court application to bring an end to the National State of Disaster.
Felix said the DA argued, "that we don't need this draconian structure to govern us during this time".
Furthermore, the DA argued that "the government is using the state of disaster to do what they want to do with very little oversight".
The initial state of disaster was set to lapse in June 2020.
Existing legislation enabled the Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister to extend the state of disaster by notice in the gazette for one month at a time.
