Category: Medical

A military convoy struck a roadside bomb in the northwest of the conflict-wracked Central African Republic, leaving two police officers and three Russian paramilitaries dead, the government said Sunday.

Tensions have been high in the country of 4.7 million since a December presidential election, although a recent surge in violence is just the latest in a civil war that has lasted since the ouster of President Francois Bozize in 2013.

“Three Russian allies and two Central African police officers were killed,” government spokesman Ange Maxime Kazagui told AFP, while U.N. sources said the attack Thursday also wounded five members of the Central African security forces.

They said the convoy was blown up on the road between Berberati and Bouar, more than 400 kilometers (250 miles) from the capital Bangui.

A Russian helicopter was sent to the scene to recover the victims’ bodies and the wounded, the sources said.

Moscow, which wields significant influence in the poor African nation, has since 2018 maintained a large contingent of “instructors” to train the Central African army.

They were joined in December by hundreds more Russian paramilitaries, along with Rwandan troops, who were key in helping President Faustin Archange Touadera’s army to thwart a rebellion.

Bangui referred to the Russian “military” in a bilateral defense accord, before Moscow corrected it by referring to them as “instructors.”

Numerous witnesses and NGOs say the instructors are in fact paramilitaries from the Wagner Group, a shadowy private military company that is actively participating in the fight against CAR rebels, alongside Rwandan special forces and U.N. peacekeepers.

On Friday, the U.N. said 11 people were killed in less than a month by mines in the country, mainly in the northwest where some of the last bastions of rebel groups are located.

The presence of roadside bombs and mines is a rather new phenomenon in the country, despite years of conflict.

Most of the territory of the perennially unstable former French colony is divided among numerous armed bands.

Source: Voice of America

Nigerian authorities confirmed that at least 60 people have died in a boat accident on the Niger River and that 83 missing passengers are also feared dead.

The boat with more than 160 passengers, including many children and women, sank after hitting an object and breaking up Wednesday while traveling along Nigeria’s largest river in Kebbi state, in the northwestern part of the country.

Emergency workers continued recovery efforts Friday. Bodies were carried from the team’s boat near the riverbank to a waiting ambulance.

Workers recovered 55 bodies on Thursday to bring the death toll to 60 so far, according to Sani Dododo, chairman of the Kebbi State Emergency Management Agency.

“We hope to recover more bodies Friday,” he said, adding that he fears the 83 passengers still missing might not be found alive.

Twenty-two passengers were rescued shortly after the accident, but no other person has been rescued alive since then.

Among the dead was a baby not yet a year old.

Recovery efforts are slow because the river is high and moving swiftly, making conditions dangerous for the divers and workers in boats, Dododo said.

It was unclear what caused the boat to break up as it was traveling from Nigeria’s Niger state to the town of Wara in Kebbi state.

Boat accidents are common in Nigeria, especially on the Niger River, with causes including overloading, the bad state of many boats, and underwater debris that the vessels often hit.

Source: Voice of America

Uganda is seeing a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases, forcing its health officials to take stern emergency measures. From 200 cases per day in April, the East African country is now recording over 1,000 cases per day amid a looming vaccine shortage.

At the Ministry of Health, hundreds of people line up standing, others sitting, as the line snakes its way to the vaccination tent.

Uganda’s COVID-19 cases stand at 44,594, with 361 deaths. Dr. Yonas Tegegn Woldemariam, the country’s representative at the World Health Organization, spells out the rate at which the coronavirus is spreading in Uganda.

“On the week starting from 25 April, Uganda reported 256 cases. The week starting 2nd May, that number went up to 411. The week of the 9th of May, the number went to 475. And the week of the 16 May, the number has already reached 1,060,” he said.

Kampala is among 10 districts that have recorded a high number of cases.

Odoi Paul, 39, is among the many who thronged to the Ministry of Health on Thursday to get their first jab.

“To make sure that I’m free from COVID-19. Like in India, people are dying, in USA. Like, that is why I say, let me also go and save my life before such a thing happens in our country,” said Paul.

Dr. Henry Mwebesa, the director of health services, notes that it has taken the country less than 10 days to get to a full-blown pandemic.

The most affected group is people between the ages of 20 and 39, and the number of severely and critically ill COVID-19 patients is higher than it was in the first wave.

Dr. Mwebesa says officials are making tough decisions to ensure that people in densely populated areas such as Kampala get the vaccine.

“To also note with concern that some districts, especially in the Eastern and Northern regions, have not performed as well. So, the strategic committee meeting of the Ministry of Health resolved that vaccines be withdrawn from the poorly performing districts, and that the exercise should commence 27th May, which is today,” he said.

In March, Uganda received 964,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine from the COVAX facility, with 100,000 doses coming from India. Since March 10, about 550,000 people have been vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine.

A second batch of vaccines was expected starting this month. But Dr. Woldemariam says that is not guaranteed.

“The supply we were expecting in May hasn’t come, and it’s unlikely to come in June. So, we are working towards seeing where we can get an alternative supplier other than India. Globally, now there is a big effort for big countries which have excess to vaccines to donate, so, we are looking into whether we will benefit from that,” he said.

To show the full extent of the second wave, tonight the three major local television stations in Uganda will anchor a joint news bulletin under the theme, Act or Perish.

Source: Voice of America

Kenya’s western city of Kisumu has surpassed the capital, Nairobi, as having the country’s highest number of confirmed COVID-19 infections. The jump in cases comes a day after an opposition leader addressed large crowds in Kisumu, which also reported Kenya’s first case of the variant first spotted in India.

According to the Health Ministry, the county of Kisumu is recording a high number of COVID-19 positive cases.

The lakeside city Tuesday recorded almost a third of all 382 positive cases recorded in the country.

Kisumu County Health Minister Boaz Otieno says the outbreak has escalated over past 10 days or so.

“We are a major transmission zone to date,” said Otieno. “We have over 4,000 cases that have been confirmed as of the end of last week, and about 3,000 or so of them had been diagnosed in the last seven days.”

Otieno blames Kisumu’s increase on the easing of restrictions in the capital Nairobi and surrounding areas.

“There was an inevitable rebound influx. Generally, there is a lot of traffic between Kisumu, Nakuru and Nairobi,” said Otieno. “So if you confine people and then you release the tendency is people to kind of rebound and go back home.”

In late March, President Uhuru Kenyatta restricted people’s movements in Nairobi and in the counties of Kajiado, Nakuru, Kiambu and Machakos in an effort to contain a rise in COVID-19 cases.

The president eased restrictions a month later.

Health officials have warned the country may witness another wave of cases in July if people continue to disregard health protocols designed to limit the spread of the coronavirus.

The increase in infections comes as Kisumu County prepares to host an Independence Day ceremony on June 1 that Kenyatta is set to attend.

Leunora Odinga is a Kisumu resident who has mixed feelings about the upcoming event.

“I may be worried but at the same time anxious to see my president come and talk to us. Some of us have not seen him,” Odinga said. “We need development and without development, we cannot prosper. It’s the people who have to take precautions to take care of themselves.”

Two weeks ago, Kisumu was the first town in Kenya to record a case of the Indian COVID-19 variant.

Otieno said there is nothing to worry about and health protocols will be followed during the ceremony.

“For the main venue will have a very limited number, the stadium has a population capacity of over 30,000 but it will only allow 3,000 people in by invitation and the siting will be very controlled. Ensuring masks and washing of hands will be ensured,” Otieno said. “

Kenya’s Health Minister Mutahi Kagwe said Tuesday that at least 950,000 people countrywide were vaccinated against the coronavirus.

The East African nation has recorded 169,000 COVID-19 cases and more than 3,000 deaths from the disease.

Source: Voice of America

Regional officials reported strong earthquakes Tuesday in the area surrounding the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) Mount Nyiragongo volcano, three days after it erupted, killing 32 people, destroying villages, and displacing at least 5,000 residents.

The Rwanda Seismic Monitor reported on its Twitter account several quakes Tuesday, including a 5.3-magnitude quake in the borderlands between Rwanda and the eastern DRC, near Mount Nyiragongo. The quakes have raised fears among locals that the volcano could erupt again.

Mount Nyiragongo — one of Africa’s most active — erupted Saturday for the first time since 2002, sending a river of lava downhill toward Goma, a city of some 2 million people 13 kilometers away. The molten rock stopped a few hundred meters short of city limits, but not before it destroyed about 1,000 homes, officials said.

At a briefing in Geneva, U.N. Refugee Agency (UNHCR) spokesman Boris Cheshirkov told reporters that 32 people died in incidents related to the eruption, including seven people killed by lava and five asphyxiated by gas.

He said two villages on Goma’s northern tip were destroyed, and two others were partially covered by lava. Several neighborhoods were left without electricity, and there are fears of water shortages.

Cheshirkov briefed reporters following a joint evaluation involving the DRC government, the United Nations and other humanitarian agencies. UNICEF reported that more than 150 children were separated from their families amid the chaos and more than 170 children are feared missing.

Along with the tremors, the UNHCR reports the lava lake in the volcano’s crater appears to have refilled, adding to fears of a second eruption.

Source: Voice of America

South Sudan’s National Task Force on COVID-19 is sending back 72,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine to the COVAX facility for use in other countries before the doses expire.

South Sudan received 132,000 doses in late March from COVAX, a global coalition that works to ensure fair and equitable access of coronavirus vaccines worldwide.

The ministry decided to give back the doses after discussing the matter with the World Health Organization, said South Sudan’s Health Ministry undersecretary, Dr. Mayen Machuot.

“We don’t want to run the risk of [the drug] expiring here in our hands. It will be accounted for, so we are committing back an amount of 72,000 doses so that they are used by someone who can deploy these doses in one week and then once we finish with our 60,000,” Machuot told reporters at a Juba news conference.

The COVAX facility wrote back to the government, saying it was happy with the arrangement, as the doses will not go to waste.

Machuot said South Sudan failed to use its doses because of a slow, initial response from health care workers to get vaccinated, delays by parliament to approve the vaccine’s use, and a lengthy time to train vaccinators.

“We are struggling economically and this means it is labor intensive. It is an emergency vaccination, that’s why we have problems of funding the deployment itself. We are actually tightening our belts and that’s why hopefully in the next two weeks, the 60,000 we have will be dispersed all over the country,” said Machuot.

Dr. Angelo Goup, director for emergency preparedness and response at the health ministry and a COVID task force member, said after health workers and the elderly were prioritized, the team opened vaccinations to the general public but many people were still reluctant to get the jab.

“One of the major challenges that is raised by citizens are these negative videos on social media. We have assembled those videos whereby some people say this vaccine is not a vaccine, it’s just a genetic material for the virus, it doesn’t protect people,” Dr. Goup told VOA’s South Sudan in Focus program.

He said the task force is doing its best to dispel those kinds of myths and educate the public about the importance of taking the vaccine. He urged people 16 and above to get vaccinated for their safety. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Source: Voice of America

Torrents of lava poured into villages after dark in eastern Congo with little warning, leaving at least 15 people dead amid the chaos and destroying more than 500 homes, officials and survivors said Sunday.

The eruption of Mount Nyiragongo on Saturday night sent about 5,000 people fleeing from the city of Goma across the nearby border into Rwanda, while another 25,000 others sought refuge to the northwest in Sake, the U.N. children’s agency said Sunday.

More than 170 children were feared missing Sunday, and UNICEF officials said they were organizing transit centers to help unaccompanied children in the wake of the disaster.

Goma ultimately was largely spared the mass destruction it suffered the last time the volcano erupted back in 2002. Hundreds died then and more than 100,000 people were left homeless. But in outlying villages closer to the volcano, Sunday was marked by grief and uncertainty.

Aline Bichikwebo and her baby managed to escape when the lava flow reached her village, but she said her mother and father were among those who died. Community members gave a provisional toll of 10 dead in Bugamba alone, though provincial authorities said it was too soon to know how many lives were lost.

Bichikwebo says she tried to rescue her father but wasn’t strong enough to move him to safety before the family’s home was ignited by lava.

“I am asking for help because everything we had is gone,” she said, clutching her baby. “We don’t even have a pot. We are now orphans and we have nothing.”

The air remained thick with smoke because a number of homes had caught fire when the lava came.

“People are still panicking and are hungry,” resident Alumba Sutoye said. “They don’t even know where they are going to spend the night.”

Elsewhere, authorities said at least five people died in a truck crash while they were trying to evacuate Goma, but the scale of the loss had yet to be determined in some of the hardest-hit communities.

Residents said there was little warning before the dark sky turned a fiery red, sending people running in all directions. One woman went into labor and gave birth while fleeing the eruption to Rwanda, the national broadcaster there said.

Smoke rose Sunday from smoldering heaps of lava in the Buhene area near the city.

“We have seen the loss of almost an entire neighborhood,” Innocent Bahala Shamavu said. “All the houses in Buhene neighborhood were burned and that’s why we are asking all the provincial authorities and authorities at the national level as well as all the partners, all the people of good faith in the world, to come to the aid of this population.”

Elsewhere, witnesses said lava had engulfed one highway connecting Goma with the city of Beni. However, the airport appeared to be spared the same fate as 2002 when lava flowed onto the runways.

Goma is a regional hub for many humanitarian agencies in the region, as well as the U.N. peacekeeping mission. While Goma is home to many U.N. peacekeepers and aid workers, much of surrounding eastern Congo is under threat from myriad armed groups vying for control of the region’s mineral resources.

Source: Voice of America