South Africa's total number of COVID-19 infections has reached 2,919,332 from 18,342,808 tests conducted cumulatively since the onset of the pandemic, according to data from the country's national public health institute.

The latest report published on Saturday by the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) showed that the country registered 449 new cases in the previous 24 hours from a total of 28,196 tests conducted.

In the same period, 23 deaths were registered, taking the country's total number of virus-related fatalities to 88,914.

With those figures, South Africa remains to be the hardest-hit country by the pandemic in Africa.

The country accounts for 34.21 per cent of the continent's virus load and 40.94 of its death toll.

Gauteng province's 918,894 infections are the highest recorded in the country. Two other provinces have reported more than half a million cases; KwaZulu Natal (515,076) and Western Cape (513,154).

The government is targeting higher vaccination rates to return the country to normalcy.

So far, more than 21.2 million vaccine doses have been administered.