Kenyans have expressed mixed reactions ahead of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s address on the Covid-19 pandemic in the country.
The head of state is on Friday expected to give further directions on the country’s way forward and a revised plan of how the country will combat the Covid-19 pandemic in the wake of an upsurge of new infections.
Health CS Mutahi Kagwe on Tuesday said that Kenya is now officially on its third wave of the pandemic.
“In some other countries, the third wave has had devastating effects and we hope that is not what we will experience in our nation,” said CS Kagwe on Thursday while addressing the press on the Covid-19 cases in the country.
Kenyans specifically on Twitter took to the platform to air out their views; some saying that the curfew should be lifted adding that if extended further, more businesses are likely to shut down.
“If the curfew is extended, all Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) rallies and campaigns should be canceled,” read a part of Wangari Anita’s tweet.
“There are businesses that will completely die if Uhuru Kenyatta extends the curfew,” tweeted X-tian Dela.
“Every time the President is scheduled to make a Covid-19 situational address, the positive cases dramatically shoots (sic) up, the newspaper headlines get sensational. Anyway, mask and sanitize, I have my doubts on curfew getting lifted,” read a tweet by Kenya West.
On the other hand, others say that with the increasing cases of Covid-19 and the rise of the positivity rate to about 14 percent as of Wednesday, the containment measures should be extended further to protect the population.
On Thursday, the country recorded the highest number of new infections (823) since the year began, a number that was last recorded in November last year.
A situational analysis report of the pandemic dated March 1, 2021 indicates the first week of November as the start of the second peak, with 9,399 cases reported in just seven days.
In his address on Wednesday, CS Kagwe appealed to Kenyans to continue adhering to the measures set by the Ministry of Health and World Health Organisation to ensure more cases do not overrun the system.
The CS further asked Kenyans to brace themselves for stricter measures.
“It’s now time to start looking back at some of the measures we have taken on whether to make some mandatory requirements of the population.”
With the recent spike in infections, President Uhuru’s choices are now hanging on a balance on whether to lift or extend the containment measures, which include a dusk-to-dawn curfew that has been in place for almost one year.
The containment measures to curb the spread of the virus were last put in place on January 4 and are to lapse today.
