Committee Stresses Need for Community Engagement, Increasing Testing to Contain Virus

Addis Ababa July 15/2020(ENA) The Ministerial Committee for COVID-19 has emphasized today on the need for enhancing community engagement and scaling up testing capacity to contain the spread of Coronavirus in the country.

The committee discussed about the current status of COVID-19, performance of the emergency proclamation, and directions to contain the virus.

During the discussion, Chairman of the committee and Deputy Prime Minister Demeke Mekonen said organized community engagement and Coronavirus testing have to be continued to contain the spread of the virus.

There has to be continued community wide prevention campaign at the national level and every citizen must apply the principles and procedures to contain the virus.

He further stated that the country needs to take lessons from countries that have successfully contained and controlled the virus.

Reporting about the spread of the pandemic, Health Minister Advisor Dr. Sintayehu Tsegaye said 92 percent of the infected are asymptomatic, that is they do not show any symptom of the virus.

Some 61 percent of the infected are male and the rest female, it was learned.

The advisor added that 1.8 percent of the total infected persons in the country lost their live,  and 75 percent of the death is in the capital Addis Ababa.

According to Sintayehu, the country has carried out over 302,000 tests and 8,475 persons are infected.

On the other hand, the guideline that sets 72 hours quarantine time for people coming from abroad with COVID-19 free certificate and entering into Ethiopia has been revised and raised   to 5 days.