HEALTH - The African Mirror

Jan

20

2021

Zimbabwe’s foreign minister dies after contracting COVID-19

COVID-19

ZIMBABWE’S foreign minister, Sibusiso Moyo, has died after contracting COVID-19, presidential spokesman George Charamba has announced. Moyo, a former army general who announced the military coup that led to the removal of the late long-serving leader Robert Mugabe in November 2017. Moyo died at a local hospital early on Wednesday, Charamba said. "The nation will be kept apprised of further developments regarding this untimely demise of the late minister, himself a decorated soldier and freedom fighter," Charamba said. Moyo was one of several generals who, after helping plot the coup, were rewarded with senior positions in President Emmerson Mnangagwa's cabinet…

Jan

20

2021

By The African Mirror

EXCLUSIVE – COVID-19 shots to cost $3 to $10 in Africa

COVID-19

DAVID LEWIS and ALEXANDER WINNING AFRICAN countries will pay between $3 and $10 per vaccine dose to access 270 million COVID-19 shots secured this month by the African Union (AU), according to a draft briefing on the plan prepared by the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) and provided to Reuters. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who serves as AU chair, said last week arrangements had been made with the bank to support member states who want access to vaccines. Countries can pay back the loans in instalments over five to seven years, the document showed. Afreximbank's press office declined to answer…

Jan

20

2021

By The African Mirror

Moroccan PM blames global market for vaccine delay

COVID-19

MOROCCO’S prime minister has defended his government's COVID-19 vaccine policy after weeks of false hopes it could quickly roll out a national programme, saying supplies were going to rich countries and those that produced the vaccine. Speaking in parliament, Prime Minister Saad Dine El Otmani said that despite ordering 65 million doses of vaccine from Britain's AstraZeneca Plc and China's Sinopharm, Morocco had so far received no supplies. "Most countries are complaining of this scarcity," he said, adding that rich countries were paying up to five times more money to get prior access and that it was natural that countries…

Jan

20

2021

By The African Mirror

Rwanda re-imposes strict lockdown in capital after COVID-19 cases surge

COVID-19

RWANDA has re-introduced tough lockdown measures in its capital Kigali after a surge in coronavirus cases. The government has also banned movement into and out of the city, except for essential services and for tourists, it said, citing a jump in the number of cases found in a given sample of tests, known as the positivity rate. "All employees, public and private, shall work from home, except for those providing essential services," the government said in a statement. Rwanda, which has 11,259 cases of the disease caused by the coronavirus and 146 deaths, said the number of tests returning positive…

Sep

04

2021

By The African Mirror

South African health minister says C.1.2 variant not a threat for now

COVID-19

SOUTH Africa's Health Minister Joe Phaahla said on Friday that scientists had told the government that at this stage the C.1.2 coronavirus variant detected locally was not a threat. The C.1.2 variant was first identified in May and has now been seen in all of the country's nine provinces. Health Minister Joe Phaahla It contains some mutations associated in other variants with increased transmissibility and reduced sensitivity to neutralising antibodies, leading researchers to flag its detection to the government and the World Health Organization (WHO). "At this stage, they (scientists) have assured us it's not really a threat, they are…

Sep

03

2021

By The African Mirror

Lobby groups call on government to double sugar tax to fight ill-health

HEALTH

ABBEY MAKOE A group of prominent economic, medical and public health scholars made an impassioned plea to both the South African National Treasury and the SA Revenue Services (SARS), in a rare open letter published in the mainstream media, to double the “sugar tax”. In the widely debated letter since then, the society’s brightest minds – evidently concerned about the impact and contribution of sugar particularly in beverages, made a case for the relevant authorities to double SA’s health promotion levy, commonly known as the “sugar tax”. The full-page advertisement has created a national dialogue over the effects of sugar…

Jan

09

2021

By The African Mirror

FACTBOX-Latest on worldwide spread of the coronavirus

COVID-19

THE European Union said it had secured nearly half of Pfizer's 2021 global output of COVID-19 shots, while a study found that this vaccine appears able to protect against a key mutation in the new variants. DEATHS AND INFECTIONS * Eikon users, see COVID-19: MacroVitals here for a case tracker and summary of news. EUROPE * Germany has secured 50 million vaccine doses from German biotech firms BioNTech and CureVac on top of EU supplies, a document showed, amid record daily deaths and concerns about a new variant. * France and Britain approved Moderna's vaccine, while the Mayor of London declared a…

Feb

04

2021

By The African Mirror

Nigeria to use drones to deliver vaccines

COVID-19

LIBBY GEORGE NIGERIA’S Kaduna state has signed a deal with medical delivery firm Zipline that will allow drone shipment of COVID-19 vaccines without significant state investment in cold-chain storage, the company has announced. Kaduna's partnership with Zipline, which delivered more than 1 million doses of other vaccines in Africa over the past year, will also enable on-demand delivery of blood products, medications and other vaccines. "It will help ensure that millions of people in Kaduna State will always get the care they need," Kaduna Governor Nasir El-Rufai said. Zipline said its end-to-end cold chain distribution capability, which can safely deliver…

Feb

04

2021

By The African Mirror

COVAX allocates at least 330 million COVID vaccines for poor countries

COVID-19

THE COVAX coronavirus vaccine sharing scheme has allocated at least 330 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines for poorer countries in the first half of 2021, the GAVI vaccine alliance said yesterday. The allocation includes an initial 240 million doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford COVID-19 vaccine made by the Serum Institute of India, an additional 96 million doses of the same shot made by AstraZeneca, plus 1.2 million doses of Pfizer -BioNTech'S COVID-19 vaccine. Publishing an interim distribution plan, the COVAX Facility, which is co-led by GAVI, the World Health Organization, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the U.N. Children's Fund,…

Feb

04

2021

By The African Mirror

Guinea says China will donate 200,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses

COVID-19

CHINA will donate 200,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine to Guinea, the West African nation's foreign minister Ibrahima Khalil Kaba told Reuters yesterday. China's ambassador in Conakry announced the donation in a meeting on Tuesday, Kaba said. He did not specify which Chinese-developed vaccine would be donated or when the doses would arrive. While vaccination campaigns are well underway in many wealthy countries, limited early access to vaccines made by Western drugmakers means most African countries have yet to launch inoculation drives. So-called vaccine diplomacy by China and Russia is cultivating goodwill in parts of the world after pharmaceutical companies including…