Guideline for medical certification of death in the COVID-19 era

COVID-19 was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) in March 2020[1] following an outbreak of a pneumonia of unknown aetiology associated with a novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China.[2] There are currently over 8.6 million cases of COVID-19 worldwide with over 450 000 deaths[3] – and still counting. The pandemic is gradually accelerating in Africa, with more than 200 000 cases and currently over 5 600 deaths, only five countries (Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa (SA) and Sudan) accounting for more than 70% of the deaths. [4] In SA, COVID-19 had resulted in over 2 900 deaths (over 175 000 cases)[5] by the beginning of July.