President Uhuru Kenyatta on Sunday, July 5, warned against complacency in Africa's Covid-19 response saying, the pandemic is likely to get worse in coming months.
Speaking during a webinar on post-COVID-19 reconstruction organised by the African chapter of the International Summit Council for Peace (ISCP-Africa), the Head of State reiterated the need to maintain the measures being implemented by African countries to help in slowing down the spread of Covid-19
"We need to actively prepare for the looming crisis. Let me, however, hasten to add, that there is no room for complacency," he cautioned.
President Uhuru also commended Africa's concerted response to Covid-19, saying measures implemented by African countries are helping slow down Coronavirus spread, "For a continent with 1.2 billion people, we have about 400,000 confirmed cases and just over 10,000 deaths. For comparison, that is about 15% of the cases in the United States and 7% of US deaths," he stated.
On the home front, Kenya's Covid-19 cases have been on a worrying trend, with 1,924 individuals testing positive in the last 7 days after 23,942 samples were tested, representing 8% of the populous.
The national government implemented several measures to mitigate the spread of the virus including the cessation of movement order that has seen residents of Nairobi and Mombasa confined to their respective county borders since April 5.
On March 27, 2020, the President announced a nationwide dusk-to-dawn curfew which he adjusted on June 6, to span from 9 p.m to 4 a.m.
This ushered in a gradual re-opening of the economy with restaurants allowed to operate within a prescribed time slot.
In his defence of the decision to extend the partial lockdown within the hotspots, the Head of State argued that relaxing the interventions by 20% would lead to 200,000 infections and 30,000 deaths by December 2020.
He is expected to issue fresh directives on Monday, July 6, with the entire nation eager to hear what the next course of action will be as the country battles to flatten the curve.
In his latest statement, the President revealed that he was working hand in hand with religious institutions to provide critical outreach to vulnerable communities and have an extensive network of faith-based health and education infrastructure critical in Covid-19 response.
On March 22, Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe directed that all churches, mosques and other places of worship be shut as the country experienced an upsurge in coronavirus cases.
Watch CS Kagwe's speech below:
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