“What we have to believe as people of faith is that the Lord is in control as we read in psalms 127 – If the Lord does not keep the city, in vain are the watchmen,” Bishop Jjumba addressed the MPs.
“But we have to be involved,” the Bishop continued, calling on the Ugandan “government to do whatever possible measures through the organs of health, security so that those who can come are stopped or quarantined in order to control infection and transition of the deadly virus.”
In Kenya, where the country’s High Court Friday, February 28 ordered that flights from China be temporarily suspended following a petition by the Law Society of Kenya, Archbishop Martin Kivuva of Mombasa has asked medical doctors to be on the alert and the country’s health ministry to be prepared just in case the virus gets detected in the country.
Kenyans expressed concerns about their exposure to the deadly disease particularly after some 239 Chinese passengers were allowed entry into the country February 26 aboard China Southern Airlines from Guangzhou, China, the Kenyan government giving them the condition of a 14-day “self-quarantine”.
“Self-quarantine can never work, serikali acha utoto (government, stop kidding),” Deddy Evans, a Kenyan was filmed saying while protesting outside Nairobi-based Milimani law courts and, addressing government authorities in Kenya added, “Stop making silly decisions on our behalf.”
After Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, diagnosed the first case of the feared virus in sub-Saharan Africa Friday, February 28, the World Health Organization warned against the “fatal mistake” of complacency because the outbreak of the virus is “getting bigger” and that “most, if not, all countries” could be reached.
Other cases of the virus had been reported in Algeria and Egypt, but not in sub-Saharan region of Africa. The case in Nigeria involves an Italian man who returned to Nigeria’s largest city, Lagos early this week.
The virus was not detected at the airport when he arrived from Milan in Italy the evening of February 24 and reports indicate that he did not have symptoms at that time. He became ill after traveling through Lagos and presented himself to a hospital, Nigeria’s health minister said.
Authorities in the West African nation are working toward meeting and observing other passengers who were with the Italian patient on the flight. The authorities are also seeking to identify people the Italian man met including the places he visited in Lagos, a city with some 20 million inhabitants.
Commissioner Akin Abayomi has been quoted as saying that the Italian patient had been transferred to Lagos State Biosecurity Facilities for isolation and further testing and that he was being managed at the Infectious Disease Hospital in Yaba, Lagos.
