{"id":967359,"date":"2024-05-28T07:21:53","date_gmt":"2024-05-28T07:21:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/dm-simulator-v2\/?p=967359"},"modified":"2024-05-28T07:21:53","modified_gmt":"2024-05-28T07:21:53","slug":"voters-urged-to-take-health-precautions-amid-flu-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/voters-urged-to-take-health-precautions-amid-flu-season\/","title":{"rendered":"Voters urged to take health precautions amid flu season\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"rt-reading-time\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading Time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\">&lt; 1<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minute<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">The South African Medical Association (SAMA) is urging the electorate to practice social distancing, wear a mask and sanitise when going to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sabcnews.com\/sabcnews\/943571-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">cast their ballots<\/a> on the last day of special votes today and tomorrow during the general election.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">This as the National Institute For Communicable Diseases\u00a0(NICD)\u00a0says South Africa is currently experiencing the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sabcnews.com\/sabcnews\/health-department-urges-public-to-get-flu-vaccines\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">annual influenza\u00a0(flu)\u00a0season<\/a>, with a number of flu strains in circulation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Influenza is a highly contagious viral infection that can lead to severe symptoms such as high fever, body aches and respiratory problems.<\/p>\n<p>It can also lead to serious complications, especially for vulnerable groups like the elderly, young children and people with chronic health conditions.<\/p>\n<p><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">With millions of people expected to turn out in the<\/span><span xml_lang=\"en-za\">ir<\/span><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">\u00a0numbers at polling stations nationwide, the<\/span><span xml_lang=\"en-za\">\u00a0<\/span><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">risk of viruses spreading is high. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">SAMA Chairperson Dr Mvuyisi Mzukwa says citizens should also consider getting vaccinated as a form of protection.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span xml_lang=\"en-us\">\u201cJust protect yourself, put on a mask, and if possible, keep a distance because I mean, it matters when it comes to respiratory infections, so I would strongly recommend that we still apply those COVID measures that we used to apply in the past.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h4><strong>VIDEO | Flu remains a health threat:\u00a0<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p><iframe title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/B9L_qchgDyU?si=VFdfDtAtQ2ooDfLh\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reading Time: &lt; 1 minute The South African Medical Association (SAMA) is urging the electorate to practice social distancing, wear a mask and sanitise when going to cast their ballots on the last day of special votes today and tomorrow during the general election.\u00a0 This as the National Institute For Communicable Diseases\u00a0(NICD)\u00a0says South Africa is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":967360,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1895],"tags":[2739,2740,2741,2742],"class_list":["post-967359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-influenza-flu-season","tag-national-institute-for-communicable-diseases","tag-sama","tag-south-african-medical-association"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/967359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=967359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/967359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/967360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=967359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=967359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elections.sabc.co.za\/elections2024\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=967359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}