DR. KALU NELLY
There have been many speculations about the likely fate of Africa in the face of the Coronavirus Pandemic. This is largely because of its weak primary health care systems and widespread Poverty.
Some Western countries have begun to evacuate their nationals from Africa, expecting the worst as the number of COVID 19 infections have increased throughout the continent.
God forbid! Last time I said we should drop our Qurans and Bibles now will be a good time to pick them up again.
Global predictions say that Africa will have over 39,000 deaths and that was over 3 weeks ago, phew!
The question; is Africa with its myriads of social-economic challenges such as hunger, economic recession, health workers strike, increase in crime etc. ready for a Pandemic of this magnitude?
Africa is a dynamic and unique Continent with abundant natural resources and Greenland, human population and a beautiful climate.
Sadly, underdevelopment pervades the Continent; corruption, maladministration, poor standard of education, diseases like Malaria are still endemic in this region, high maternal and child mortality still the highest in the World, malnutrition and extreme poverty still exists.
According to AfricaRenewal (2016) “if there is one area that vividly sums up Africa’s development challenges, it is the field of health.”
The World Health Organization (WHO) said “Africa carries 25% of the world’s disease burden but its share of global health expenditures is less than 1%. Worse still, it manufactures only a fraction—less than 2%—of the medicines consumed on the continent.”
When the news of the Pandemic first broke, an analysis was made by the Harvard University and it revealed that Egypt, Algeria and South Africa were at risk of recording the most cases of Coronavirus Infections. This is evident with Egypt having the index case in Africa but thankfully the country is one of the few countries in Africa with a sound healthcare system.
Other countries that were mentioned to be moderately at risk were Nigeria, Ethiopia, Sudan, Angola, Tanzania, Ghana and Kenya.
These countries eventually witnessed a rise in Coronavirus cases and the lockdowns have been imposed.
Still, Africa is yet to feel the magnitude of the Pandemic on its fragile healthcare system. Already the economies across the Continent have been dealt a huge blow.
PROFESSOR CHARLES CHUKWUMA SOLUDO, a political economist and former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in one of his articles emphasized on the disadvantages of the lockdowns on the economies of African countries.
In his submission, he said “economic recession will kill Africans faster than the COVID-19” while BILL GATES, the founder of the BILL AND MELINDA GATES FOUNDATION believes the lockdowns will be beneficial for Africans until a vaccine is developed.
On a global scale, scientists are worried about the prognosis of the disease in Africa, and some have predicted that it will be worse than Europe with “dead bodies” on the streets.
Senegal surprisingly has stepped up its game with the announcement of a plan to test every one of her citizens with or without symptoms with a $1 testing strip and improvised ventilators with just $60. An intervention that would normally cost over $17,000 (I bet China did not see that coming).
Bad business for those who thought they could play a fast one and manufacture ventilators.
Shocking even to the Western World itself, it seems like Africa will be okay.
Ghana, Tanzania and a couple of other countries scaled-up testing and even relaxed their lockdowns.
Yes, the Coronavirus, Code named: COVID -19 has been put moderately in check but we still need to do more, especially in countries without the political will and financial capacity to tackle the disease.
What does it take to be prepared for a Pandemic of this magnitude? We need communities to have a well-grounded primary healthcare system, strengthened at the state and local government levels, excellent border protection, strong surveillance system, robust case detection mechanism, effective tracing and a good health education department to see the proper dissemination of the right information. Also having the proper infrastructure and protective equipment will be useful.
How many African communities can boast of standard local healthcare system?. Maybe in towns and urban areas but the sub-urban, peri-urban, rural areas, the hard to reach areas don’t have enough health care support system.
To put salt on injury even the low resource communities have to pay out-of-pocket when it comes to health care financing.
Then the worst; HIV, tuberculosis, malaria and more communicable diseases are yet to be eradicated and we are yet faced with a modern-day plague like the Coronavirus, Ebola and Lassa viruses.
Thank goodness! Scientists’ predictions for Africa are not manifesting, it has come to be a thing of a shock to the global community that the death rates are still very low considering that some countries did not have quick responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic news.
Many speculations as to why the disease has not gone as predicted, some believe it is the presence of the high temperature and other believe that because the region is endemic to Malaria, therefore more people are likely to use antimalarial drugs which has a weakening effect on the disease.
I hope that Africa will decide to take care of itself once the Pandemic is over; this challenging period has brought to light some fundamental issues that need to be tackled.
At the end of the day, after all, is said and done we cannot drink crude oil or eat Gold and Silver neither can we eat our Dollar notes.
As we continue to grapple with the containment of this ”unseen enemy” let us remember the words of Masimba et al: “Governments should concentrate on providing access to basic health care and affordable drugs, training more community health workers and extending medical insurance coverage through creative partnerships with the private sector.”
Dr Kalu Nelly [OD] is an Optometrist with over 10 years experience in the field of eye health. A Social Commentator and a health blogger. She writes from Abuja.
