The Western Cape has administered at least one Covid-19 vaccine dose to more than 30% of the province's adult population.

According to the national Department of Health, 30.4% of the province's 4.9-million adults have received at least one jab – the highest percentage of vaccinated people in all provinces.

The national health department is aiming to vaccinate 70% of the country's 39-million adults to protect the population against future waves of Covid-19. As of Tuesday, just under 24% of the national adult population (about 9.4-million people) had received at least one jab.

The Eastern Cape had the second highest percentage of vaccinated people who had received at least one jab, at 28%, followed by Mpumalanga with 26%.

In the Western Cape, 1 513 072 people had received at least one jab. Of those, more than 530 000 have been fully vaccinated with two doses of the Pfizer vaccine, and 93 000 with the single-dose Johnson & Johnson jab.

As of Tuesday, a combined 2 046 973 vaccine doses had been administered in the province.

The province has seen an increased demand for vaccines over the last two weeks after the vaccination programme was opened to all people 18 and older on 20 August.

Last week saw the province reaching new daily vaccination records due to the increased demand, and more than 248 000 jabs were administered from Monday to Friday.

Wednesday saw the highest number of vaccine doses (51 882) administered.

This week, the province administered 41 940 jabs on Monday and 42 628 on Tuesday.

The increased demand for vaccines comes amid early signs of a decline in Covid-19 cases in the province. The Western Cape has been at the peak of its third wave for several weeks.

On Tuesday, the province recorded 1 220 new cases.