As Somalia Covid-19 cases soar, WHO intensifies support
MOGADISHU - Somalia continues its fight against one of the most catastrophic outbreaks the country has ever witnessed. In spite of recurrent humanitarian emergencies, war and conflict, Somalia has successfully eradicated wild poliovirus and ended transmission of measles and cholera outbreaks in the recent past.
The current outbreak of COVID-19
has exposed some of the gaping holes and weaknesses in its health
system to fight and respond to an outbreak of this magnitude and scale
where human-to-human transmission can go unabated and the potential for
cases to double in a week if the health system is not able to rapidly
trace, track, test and treat those infected with the virus who remain
undiagnosed and undetected.
WHO has been supporting Somalia
since the beginning of this outbreak to enhance its testing capacities.
As the country lacks a proactive testing strategy for COVID-19, the
number of cases has continued to rise since late March when local
transmission was first identified. The country has not been able to
trace back the sources of infection of these locally-transmitted cases.
This resulted in a widespread cluster of cases and many of these people
did not know that they were harbouring the infection until it was too
late.
Owing to societal norms,
cultural practice and high population density in major urban cities,
such as in Mogadishu, self-isolation and quarantine have been a real
challenge. This resulted in active transmission in households, which has
infected a large number of elderly people living in those same
households. Recent data suggest that although the elderly population
(above 60 years) comprise of only 1–2% of the entire population in the
country, they are disproportionately affected bearing over 12% of the
burden of infection from COVID-19.
Recently, the majority of deaths
that have occurred in De-Martino hospital, the major hospital in the
capital Mogadishu city for treating COVID-19 patients, are all elderly
patients and people with chronic health conditions who have been
infected at home by other family members. In the last 3 weeks of May,
more deaths were reported (35/57: 61%) than compared with both March
(4/57; 7%) and April (18/57; 31.5%) combined.
As of 19 May 2020, the country
has reported 1502 cases, including 59 associated deaths. Among East
African countries, Somalia has reported the highest death toll. The
majority of deaths have occurred in the 60–70 year age group.
The De-Martino hospital is
equipped with 20 intensive care units. WHO has trained the health care
workers of this hospital on case management and infection control
measures. WHO has recently donated a number of critical hospital and
medical supplies to this hospital for patient care. WHO is also
assisting the hospital to automate its patient registration system for
COVID-19 so that better quality data and other key information on
patient’s survival and deaths can be recorded and analysed in real time
to aid data-driven decisions for operational response.
A number of other agencies like
the United Nations International Office of Migration (IOM), the United
Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and USAID have donated hospital supplies
and personal protective equipment for health care workers in the
hospital, a sign of solidarity from all agencies to support a country
facing one of the worst outbreaks in its history. WHO is also supporting
13 other isolation centres across the country with medical supplies,
training of health care workers and budget support for salaries.
While Africa is potentially the
next epicentre of this pandemic, it is critical to extinguish the
outbreak in Somalia as the country’s weakened health system and
infrastructure is no longer able to absorb the shock of this public
health crisis.
WHO continues to support the
country with whatever resources the Organization has in the areas of
improving coordination of operations response, surveillance and case
detection, case management and risk communication, So far, only 26% of
WHO’s urgent appeal of US$ 21.95 million for emergency response to
COVID-19 in Somalia has been funded.
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As Somalia Covid-19 cases soar, WHO intensifies support
MOGADISHU - Somalia continues its fight against one of the most catastrophic outbreaks the country has ever witnessed. In spite of recurrent humanitarian emergencies, war and conflict, Somalia has successfully eradicated wild poliovirus and ended tra