11,000 health care workers trained to tackle virus

Kenya has so far trained 11,000 health workers across the country to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic.

Health CAS Dr. Mercy Mwangangi on Monday said another 60,000 community health workers have been trained to enhance the ministry’s human resource capacity in health facilities across the country.

The CAS said the training focused on the COVID-19 awareness, infections and control measures.

She said the ministry has received support of ventilators from USAID and will be distributed to counties.

“Today is day 74 since the first case of coronavirus was reported in the country. I am happy to report that we have established isolation and quarantine facilities in all the counties with a total bed capacity of over 5,000,” she said.

Mwangangi said it is worth noting that since the first case was reported, the country had only two testing facilities but it has been up scaled to about 25.

This she said has been a major turnaround with regards to sample collection and results analysis.

Mwangangi said the government through the ministry will continue to upscale the level of preparedness to ensure that Kenyans are able to get the best healthcare services.

She said it should however be noted that the country is not yet safe as the number of positive cases continue to rise.

So far the country has reported 1,286 positive cases after some 72 new cases were reported in the last 24 hours.

The 72 were out of 2,711 samples tested.

Nine people were also discharged bringing the total number of those who have recovered to 402.

So far 52 people have died since the first case was reported.

Mwangangi said as a result, individuals with underlying conditions and those that are malnourished remain at greater risk of infections.

“Containment measures to this pandemic remain handwashing with soap, social distancing and wearing masks while in public places,” she said.

Mwangangi said though the containment measures put in place have made life difficult, they have played a key role in flattening the curve.

She said if the measures were not in place, the country would have been in a worse situation.