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Hope lies on home-based care to fight Covid-19, says Kagwe

Health CS Mutahi Kagwe (pictured) yesterday said no death has been reported out of the 7,600 Covid-19 patients who have been under the home-based care programme.

He revealed that 656 Covid-19 patients who were under the programme have recovered from the disease.

"So far, no single patient under the home-based care programme has died; we are happy with health workers because they are attending even to patients under this arrangement," said Kagwe, who was speaking at the Kakamega County Referral Hospital.

The programme is being implemented as one of the case management strategies to combat the coronavirus disease.

He said the Government will prioritise the programme to help combat coronavirus spread.

The CS also announced that the country had recorded five more deaths in 24 hours bringing the death toll to 418.

Another 699 have tested positive of Covid-19 out of a sample 7,175 bringing the total cases 25,837.

Out of the new cases, 675 are Kenyans while 24 are foreigners. 

So far, 781 patients have been discharged after recovering, bringing total recoveries to 11,899.

Dr Patrick Amoth, Acting Director General Ministry of Health indicated that over 93 per cent of all positive cases across the country are asymptomatic, with a paltry seven per cent requiring critical care.

Kagwe disclosed that the number of Covid-19 testing centres has risen to 32, spread across the country.

He said devolving testing to counties has been a problem because available machines are not compatible with the reagents available.

"We shall have more testing centres across the country once we get reagents that are compatible with machines in our hospitals," he said. 

Earlier, the CS advised counties that still have few reported positive cases of Covid-19 to embark on contact tracing.

Kagwe, who toured Mumias Level Four Hospital, urged the counties that have not diversely been affected by the corona virus diseases to embrace early contact tracing and isolation.

“Unlike Nairobi and other highly affected counties, Kakamega has few positive numbers and can contain this virus depending on the county government's ability to contact trace,” said Kagwe.

The CS said counties like Nairobi have surpassed the high numbers, making it hard for health officials to contact and trace everyone who interacted with positive patients.

Kakamega had reported 33 positive cases by Saturday, and two of the patients are still receiving medical care at Mumias Hospital while three are under home-based care.

The county has also reported two deaths as a result of Covid-19 related health complications.

Kagwe vowed to ensure that all health workers are protected in their line of duty and donated 4,000 PPEs, even as he promised to get rid of the corrupt individuals reported at the MoH headquarters in Nairobi.

The CS applauded the county in their preparedness and the way they have managed to report a few numbers of positive cases.

Kakamega has attained 300-bed capacity spread in three facilities - Kakamega County Teaching and Referral Hospital, Mumias and Likuyani level four hospitals.

Masinde Muliro University of Science Technology has been marked to be used as a quarantine centre and has the capacity to accommodate 500 beds.

[John Shilitsa, Brian Kisanji and Nathan Ochunge]

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