Coronavirus: Gambia registers third death of Convid19
Banjul, Gambia (PANA) - The Gambia has registered it third and documented death of Covid-19 following the death of a senior healthcare worker at the Edward Francis Small Teaching Hospital, the ministry of health announced here on Tuesday.
The West African nation registered its first Covid 19 death in March, following the death of a 70-year-old Bangladeshi national in the country.
And in June, a Senegalese man who died at the Kanifing General Hospital 10km outside Banjul was the second death of coronavirus, while staff of the emergency unite that attended to him were all quarantined.
“It is the country’s third documented Covid-19 death since the first case was registered in March,” the health ministry announced.
According to the ministry, the senior nurse, 50, in addition to having had an underlying health condition, was a known diabetic and had also severe pneumonia-like symptoms.
A sample was only collected from him after his demise on the 4 July and a positive test result was returned the day after.
Meanwhile, three other cases were confirmed which took the country’s total to 61. Two of them are Belgian couple, both 64, who arrived from Brussels late June. The other one is a UN staff of Gambian nationality, 45, who arrived on a World Food Programme (WFP)-charter flight from Liberia.
The country currently has 341 people in quarantine; 31 active and 8 probable cases.
The ministry said one of the challenges now is the occurrence of COVID-19 among healthcare workers, adding that low staff morale due to the lack of incentives and the non-payment of allowances, frequent power outages in the public health emergency operations centre (PHEOC) due to the reliance on National Water And Electricity Co.Ltd (NAWEC), as other stumbling blocks.
-0- PANA MSS/VAO 7July2020
