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Uganda has fastest COVID rate in Africa

Health experts positive 

Based on these figures and trends, the WHO has expressed optimism about Africa’s progress in the fight against COVID-19.

Speaking at the 70th Session of the WHO Regional Committee for Africa, Director-General Tedros Adhanom said the continent was moving positively to defeat the virus.

The Regional Committee is the highest decision-making body on health in the region, involving ministers of health from the Member States of the WHO African Region. It meets once a year to review critical health issues affecting the continent and to advise on appropriate strategies to improve health outcomes.

The WHO Director-General pointed out how all African countries now have the necessary plans and capacity to detect and respond to the virus.

“All countries on the continent now have lab testing capacity for COVID-19, compared with just two at the beginning of the pandemic,” he said.

He said the COVID-19 virus had shown the importance of investing in health.

“COVID-19 has taken so much from us. But it has also reminded us that health is not a luxury item; it is the foundation of social, economic and political stability,” he said.

Health Ministers and representatives from African countries at the meeting stressed that the pandemic was a poignant reminder for countries to bolster health systems.

“This virus has not only affected our health, but also tested our way of living, societal norms and economies at large. In Africa we quickly felt the impact of the pandemic due to our weak health systems coupled with the highest disease burden in the world,” Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali said.

To minimize the impact of the pandemic, Prime Minister Abiy called for improved COVID-19 response coordination, a common voice to ensure fair and equitable access to vaccines, diagnostics and treatment, and stronger health systems and public health emergency preparedness and response.

“COVID-19 has taught as that strong health systems are a matter of national security and survival,” he said.

“The coronavirus pandemic has proven once again the importance of investing in health systems, enhancing equitable access to care and improving readiness to prevent and control outbreaks,” said Dr Matshidiso Moeti, the WHO Regional Director for Africa. “Recovering from this pandemic will be incomplete without strong measures to bolster health systems. We must seize the opportunity and make the leap for a better tomorrow.”

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2 comments

  1. Some of this information has to be interrogated. How many WHO staff do we have in Uganda? Is there empirical evidence that people are dying from covid here in Uganda? Where out of the 2500 “confirmed” positive cases of covid there hasn’t been a single reported case? Where the so called covid deaths, no family member or relative or medical attendant prior to the death could identify the known signs and symptoms related to covid? Where one of the known musicians (shortcut) was known to be a tb patient but later his death being attributed to covid? My family is very expansive, I almost have a relative in almost every part and corner of Kampala. I’ve been to Mulago referral hospital, Mengo, Rubaga and Nsambya there’s no reported covid deaths. Where and who attends to these patients that have now been reported to have died from covid?

  2. We’re headed for a covid 19 license. Watch the space….

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