Deputy President (DP) William Ruto, on Monday, March 30, unveiled a grand plan to convert 940 public schools to emergency health centres to combat the Coronavirus pandemic.
The DP issued his statement following the March 30 announcement by the Ministry of Health Director-General Patrick Amoth, that initial projections showed the total number of coronavirus cases in Kenya could rise to 10,000 by the end of April 2020.
"The Government of Kenya has directed the ministry of education to work with all county govt's to identify at least 20 boarding schools per county to be prepared/equipped for use as health facilities as part of Covid-19 preparedness,
"The health ministry will work with governors to ensure it is done as soon as possible," reads a section of DP Ruto's statement.
The Deputy President went on thank the millions of Kenyans who had adhered to the directives issued by the national government in its bid to combat the pandemic.
"We all must continue to comply with directives on personal hygiene and curfew. We thank the millions including religious leaders for exceptional compliance. This pandemic poses an existential threat therefore every effort counts. This is no time for blame games. Let's pull together," the DP further statement.
The deputy president's plan echoes the initiatives undertaken by the Chinese government in Wuhan Province, following the outbreak of the deadly virus.
Several public institutions were converted to makeshift wards to host patients who tested positive for Covid-19, a good example being Wuhan Business University where several dormitories were turned into wards.
Six hundred rooms at the learning institution were turned into emergency health centres where a total of 2,400 patients were taken in.
In a similar move, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, on March 28, gave the country's Ministry of Youth and Sports Development the green light to open and make available four state-owned stadiums in addition to the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) orientation camps spread across the country as isolation centres for Coronavirus cases.
The stadia President Buhari highlighted were: the National Stadium, Lagos; Obafemi Awolowo Stadium, Ibadan; MKO Abiola Stadium, Abuja and Ahmadu Bello Stadium, Kaduna.
On March 30, Health Cabinet Secretary (CS) Mutahi Kagwe, announced that there were 50 cases of patients who had tested positive for Covid-19, going on to reveal that the government was going to introduce new stringent measures to contain the spread of the virus.
He went on to reveal that the new cases showed that the virus was now being spread within the country as opposed to cases announced during the first week which mostly involved individuals coming in from foreign countries.
"It is now evident that the virus is being spread through community transmission, this means the disease is no longer imported from outside but it is here with us. We are now spreading it amongst ourselves," CS Kagwe stated during his presser.
