ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 14 (Xinhua) -- COVID-19 cases on the African continent amounted to 3,142,781 as of Thursday, the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said.
According to the continental disease control and prevention agency's Africa COVID-19 dashboard, the death toll related to the pandemic stood at 75,709 as of Thursday with 2,562,961 recoveries.
The Southern African region is hardest-hit area in Africa in terms of the number of cases, followed by the Northern African region, according to the Africa CDC.
The five highly-affected African countries include South Africa with 1,278,303 cases, Morocco with 455,055 cases, Tunisia with 168,568 cases, Egypt with 152,719 cases, as well as Ethiopia with 129,455 cases. The five African countries presently account for about 69 percent of the total in Africa, it said.
Meanwhile, optimism has been ignited across the continent following the news that the Africa CDC's African Vaccine Acquisition Task Team (AVATT) had secured a provisional 270 million vaccine doses for member states.
"From the onset of this pandemic, our focus as a continent has been on collaboration and collective effort. We have held steadfastly to the principle that no country should be left behind," South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa, who is also the Chairperson of the African Union (AU), was quoted as saying in a statement.
"With this in mind, we have not only campaigned vigorously for changes through all the available international forums, but we have taken the additional step to independently secure vaccines using our own limited resources as member states," said Ramaphosa on Wednesday at a special meeting of the AU Bureau of the Assembly.
At least 50 million doses from this tranche will be available during the crucial period of April through June of this year, according to the statement issued by the South African president's Office.
The vaccines will be supplied by Pfizer, AstraZeneca (through independent licensee, Serum Institute of India), and Johnson and Johnson. Financing arrangements have been made with Afreximbank to support member states who want to access these vaccines based on a "whole-of-Africa" approach, it said.
The African continent reported its first case of COVID-19 on Feb. 14 in Egypt. The continent's cases crossed the 1 million mark on Aug. 7, and passed the 2 million mark on Nov. 19.
Amid a potential second wave of COVID-19, the total number of cases reported by the 55 African Union member countries hit the 3 million mark early this week. Enditem
