Regional Director Urges Ethiopia to Take Lessons from Severely COVID-19 Hit Countries

Addis Ababa June 23/2020 (ENA) Ethiopia needs to learn from the severely COVID-19 affected countries and enhance its surveillance capacity, Ohio State Global One Health Initiative Eastern Africa Regional Director Dr. Getnet Yimer said. 

In an exclusive interview with ENA, the director said the virus can have terrible effect on  citizens and the economy, among others, unless it is effectively mitigated.

He stressed the need for the establishment of good infrastructure for contact tracing, testing, and managing the overall health system as well as a surveillance system to contain the pandemic.

"Since the outbreak of coronavirus in Ethiopia, the government and medical personnel inside and outside hospitals have been tackling it. People, however, think that they are still in the comfort zone where the worst is yet to come,'' Dr. Getnet noted.

According to him, keeping physical distance alone cannot effectively prevent the virus. All  protective measures need to be implemented in oder to successfully control COVID-19.

The director further stressed the need for providing extra care and protection to health professionals as they could easily be exposed to the virus while providing treatment to patients.

“First, we have to believe that we are in war, and the war is led by health care professionals. If we lose the health professionals, we're going to lose the war. They are the ones who lead the war. This means there is a need to give them extra care, protection, and all what we can.”

Dr. Getnet, who is also a member of COVID-19 Related Health Advisory Council, pointed out that the government and the public should not relax as this will lead to terrible things that happened in other countries.  

He pointed out that COVID-19 cases are increasing in Ethiopia and will continue to increase for some time.

Considering all these, there are wonderful success stories that we learn even if there are no strict objective parameters to compare countries and regions, there is a lot to learn from a lot of countries.

Dr. Getnet said some countries have successfully contained COVID-19 by only implementing  wonderful guidelines set to prevent it.

Ethiopia has been doing its utmost in collaborating with the global community and organizations like Africa CDC, Jack Ma Foundation, among others.

The world is potentially facing one of the most difficult infectious situations of the last decades in which hundreds of thousands of patients are suffering and millions more are at risk.