Mozambique: Covid-19 in “community transmission” in Nampula city – AIM report

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Mozambique: Covid-19 in “community transmission” in Nampula city – AIM report

9:14 CAT | 08 Jun 2020

Photo: MIramar

The Mozambican health authorities announced on Saturday (June 7) that the Covid-19 pandemic has entered the phase of “community transmission”, at least in the northern city of Nampula.

According to Health Minister Armindo Tiago, speaking on Saturday at the daily press conference on Covid-19 (held in Nampula, rather than in Maputo), that conclusion can be drawn because of the rapid increase in the number of Nampula cases where the chain of transmission is unknown, as well as changes in the demographic and clinical profile of the cases. One notable shift is the relatively large number of children who are now being infected.

He made this announcement on a day when 55 new cases of the disease were announced, 28 of them in Nampula.

“With the current epidemiological profile, we want to inform you that the assumptions for a pattern of community transmission in Nampula City have been met”, Tiago said.

He added that the rapid development of the disease in Nampula is different from the rest of the country, where the epidemiological pattern of Covid-19 remains based on foci of transmission. Nampula city is the first place in Mozambique where the dangerous shift to community transmission seems to have taken place.

“There is a high level of person-to-person transmission in Nampula city, which is currently twice as large as the national average”, said Tiago. As for the demographics of the epidemic, “the proportion of children aged from 0-9 years, and of individuals over 60 years old is also twice the national average”.

The Ministers announced that, in order to hold back and mitigate the epidemic in Nampula, his ministry will expand “active surveillance” in the city (this is intended to catch people displaying early signs of possible Covid-19 infection, such as respiratory problems).

The authorities will also step up hygiene and sanitation activities, and prepare rapid community-based epidemiological surveys, to determine the scale of the epidemic.

Testing capacity for the coronavirus that causes Covid-19 is being installed in the city, based on PCR (polymerase chain reaction) technology. A laboratory in the city is being adapted for these tests, and Tiago said the equipment will soon be installed. This means that, once the laboratory is up and running, suspected coronavirus cases in Nampula can be tested in the city, rather than being flown to the laboratory of the National Health Institute (INS) in Maputo.

Tiago also revealed that 15 health workers have been infected with Covid-19. “We are concerned”, said the Minister, “and so we shall strengthen prevention measures among health professionals, by increasing the availability of personal protection equipment, and training our staff in its proper use”.

Tiago said that, since the start of the pandemic, 13,398 people have been tested for the coronavirus, 1.055 of them in the previous 24 hours. This is the largest number of people tested in a single 24 hour period since the outbreak began.

Of the samples tested, 341 came from Maputo province. 195 from Cabo Delgado, 184 from Nampula, 110 from Maputo city, 77 from Manica, 52 from Sofala, 39 from Inhambane, 30 from Gaza and 12 from Zambezia.

1,000 of the tests gave negative results, but the other 55 were positive for Covid-19, pushing the total number of positive cases in Mozambique to 409. 28 of the new cases are in Nampula, 13 in Cabo Delgado, 10 in Maputo province, two in Maputo city and two in Manica. 14 of the newly reported cases are health workers (13 of them in Nampula).

Following standard Ministry of Health Procedure, all 55 of these cases are now undergoing home isolation, while health staff trace their contacts.

On the brighter side, Tiago reported that a further seven Covid-19 patients have made a full recovery, six in Cabo Delgado and one in Manica. This brings the total number of patients who have recovered to 126.

The number of hospitalised Covid-19 patients remained three – two in Nampula and one in Inhambane.

The geographical breakdown of positive cases by province by Saturday was as follows: Cabo Delgado, 163; Nampula, 115; Maputo City, 63; Maputo Province, 34; Sofala, 12; Niassa, five; Tete, five; Inhambane, four; Manica, three; Gaza, three; Zambezia, two.

The basic Covid-19 statistics for Mozambique, as of Saturday, were: 409 confirmed cases, of which 126 have made a full recovery, and 280 are active cases. Three Covid-19 patients have died, two of the disease itself, and the third from an unrelated pathology.

Source: AIM