LILONGWE-(MaraviPost)-The Ministerial Special Committee on Covid-19 on Saturday, April 4, 2020 announced a fourth case of Covid-19 in Blantyre.
Addressing the press in the capital Lilongwe, the chairperson for the committee Jappie Mhango revealed that the new patient from Blantyre returned from United Kingdom and had been on self quarantine.
“The Tests were done yesterday at the College of Medicine laboratory where it was confirmed that the results are positive.
“With this new case, Malawi now has 4 new cases of coronavirus and we can confirm local transmission based on the initial three cases from Lilongwe” said Mhango who is also Malawi Health Minister.
The Health Minister also revealed that all the four confirmed cases have mild disease and government is intensifying measures to contain the disease by tracing on all those individuals that came into contact with the patients.
Mhango however recognized the shortage of health care workers in hospitals.
He therefore disclosed that the committee is working on increasing the funding allocation to the staff to be recruited in effort to fight against the pandemic.
In infrastructure, the minister said all district hospitals have reserved rooms and spaces for treatment of confirmed cases that have moderate and severe diseases.
Meanwhile, government has repaired ventilators in central hospitals and has provided an additional 20 new ventilators into all treatment site.
Using 20,000 test kits that were donated by Jack Ma, government has also assured the general population that it will continue testing all individuals with suspected cases using CHSU and College of Medicine and Liverpool Welcome Trust laboratories.
Government has also revealed that through UNICEF, it is procuring another 5000 test kits that are expected to be delivered within a month together with Personal Protective Equipments for all health care workers.
The ministry has commended WHO, UN, CDC, DFID, HSJF, governments of Norway and Germany, GAVI,The Global Fund and local organisations and companies for technical and material support to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.
