South Africa’s COVID-19 Death Toll Much Higher Than Official Tally – SAMRC

A SOUTH African report into excess deaths over the past year suggests more than 133,000 people in the country have died from COVID-19, far more than the official tally of nearly 55,000.

The South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) has been monitoring excess deaths since May 2020.

In its latest report, published on Wednesday, the SAMRC said South Africa had seen 157,000 excess deaths in the past 12 months and estimated that 85% of them were caused by COVID-19, which means just over 133,000 people have died from the disease.

This compares to an official death toll of 54,968 since the start of the pandemic.

South Africa implemented one of the world’s most restrictive lockdowns from March 2020, when cases were still relatively low, and the SAMRC said increases in weekly deaths due to the pandemic only became evident from May 2020 onwards.

Excess death figures, which some epidemiologists say