place a moratorium on the use of tents and catering at funerals as people continued to break the lockdown limit of 50 people at such events in the province.
“Because [the] number of positive cases linked to funerals is escalating, we have to do things differently,” Gomba added.
According to the national health department, the Eastern Cape had recorded five deaths so far and 25 recoveries.
Earlier this month, a retired nurse from Port Elizabeth became the province’s first coronavirus fatality.
The 66-year-old woman died at Livingstone Hospital after being in a coma for about a week, Gomba told HeraldLive.
She is reported to have attended a funeral in KwaDwesi two weeks before being admitted to hospital and was among mourners who have since tested positive.
As of Monday evening, there were 111 cases of Covid-19 at correctional service facilities across the country.
The first prison was the East London Correctional Centre in the Eastern Cape, where a staff member had reportedly fallen ill after attending a funeral in Port Elizabeth.
The department’s spokesperson, Singabakho Nxumalo, confirmed cases in the Eastern Cape remained the same, with 31 officials and 56 inmates being infected.
All 56 inmates and 30 officials are from the East London prison, while one official at the St Albans Correctional Centre in Port Elizabeth also tested positive.
