Mayoral Committee Member for Health, Patricia van de Ross, says of the 16 confirmed cases in the Western Cape, 94% were in Cape Town, mostly between the ages five and nine.<\/p>\n
Van der Ross says vaccines are one of the most effective ways to prevent diseases such as diphtheria, measles and polio.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe recent increase in diphtheria cases is a very concerning matter. Diphtheria is a preventable but life-threatening disease and ensuring that every child is vaccinated is critical to safeguarding the health and the well-being of our communities. Soon children will be back at school, in cr\u00e8che, where they will come into contact with other children. We have a duty to ensure that each and every child is protected by keeping them up to date with the vaccination schedule.\u201d<\/p>\n
–SABC–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":12430,"template":"default||default||default||default||default||default||default||default","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[],"class_list":["post-12429","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.||The South African (SA) Health authorities in Cape Town say a recent diphtheria outbreak shows the importance of timely vaccinations.","published_date":"2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00||2025-01-08 00:00:00","news_description":"","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/12429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/12429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18041,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/12429\/revisions\/18041"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=12429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}