Covid-19: President Nyusi and first lady test positive

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Covid-19: President Nyusi and first lady test positive

10:19 CAT | 04 Jan 2022

Photo: in file CoM

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi has tested positive for the coronavirus that causes the respiratory disease Covid-19, and has gone into isolation.

A Monday statement from Nyusi’s office said that, after travelling to various parts of the country in the final days of 2021, and meeting with various interest groups, Nyusi and his wife, First Lady Isaura Nyusi, decided to take a Covid-19 rapid test.

The test showed that both were infected with the coronavirus. Although neither are showing any symptoms, they have gone into isolation while they await the definitive results from a PCR (polymerase chain reaction) test.

The presidential statement concluded by urging all Mozambicans to obey the preventive measures against Covid-19. Everyone over the age of 18, Nyusi added, should ensure that they are vaccinated against the disease.

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry has announced an alarming increase in the positivity rate (the percentage of people tested who are found to be carrying the virus) from 39.2 per cent on Sunday to 45.76 per cent on Monday.

According to a Monday press release from the Ministry, since the start of the pandemic, 1,108,800 people have been tested for the coronavirus, 2,006 of them in the previous 24 hours.

1,088 of these tests yielded negative results, while 918 people tested positive for the virus. This brings the total number of Covid-19 cases diagnosed in Mozambique to 193,371. Of the cases identified on Monday, 524 were women and 394 were men. 180 were children under 15 years of age.

The geography of the current surge in Covid-19 cases may be changing. For the first time in over a month the majority of the new cases were not from Maputo city and province, but from the central region. There were 196 cases from Manica, and 136 from Sofala. Between them, these two central provinces accounted for 36.2 per cent of the new cases.

There were also 108 cases from Nampula, 99 from Gaza, 96 from Maputo city, 93 from Inhambane, 77 from Maputo province, 40 from Zambezia, 36 from Cabo Delgado, 34 from Niassa and three from Tete.

Over the same 24 hour period, 31 Covid-19 patients were discharged from hospital (21 in Maputo, three in Gaza, two each in Zambezia, Inhambane and Matola, and one in Niassa), while 52 new cases were admitted (30 in Maputo, five each in Sofala, Inhambane and Gaza, four in Zambezia, two in Manica and one in Niassa).

The number of people under medical care in the Covid-19 treatment centres rose from 193 on Sunday to 201 on Monday. 119 of these patients (59.2 per cent) were in Maputo. There were also 18 in Sofala, 15 in Inhambane, 13 in Manica, 10 in Zambezia, 10 in Matola, seven in Gaza, six in Niassa, and three in Cabo Delgado. Tete and Nampula were the only provinces where no Covid-19 patients were hospitalised.

The Health Ministry reported a further 12 deaths from Covid-19. The latest victims were seven men and five women, aged between 15 and 87. Ten of them died in Maputo, one in Sofala and one in Tete. This brings the total Covid-19 death toll in Mozambique to 2,031.

In the same 24 hour period, 1,496 people were declared to have made a full recovery from Covid-19 (1,205 in Maputo city, 141 in Sofala, 75 in Manica, 61 in Nampula and 14 in Zambezia). The total number of recoveries is now 158,680 – which is 82.1 per cent of all those ever diagnosed with Covid-19 in Mozambique.

With the number of recoveries exceeding the number of new cases, the number of active cases of Covid-19 fell – from 33,246 on Sunday to 32,656 on Monday. The geographical distribution of the active cases was: Maputo province, 7,561 (23.2 per cent of the total); Maputo city, 7,302; Inhambane, 3,665; Gaza, 3,587; Manica, 2,688; Sofala, 2,552; Cabo Delgado, 1,633; Nampula, 1,341; Zambezia, 1,130; Tete, 722; and Niassa. 475.

Source: AIM