by Christopher Makaza
President Emmerson Mnangagwa has called upon individuals and organisations to complement Government efforts in the mobilisation of resources towards COVID-19 which has since claimed three lives.
The country yesterday recorded a third death, a 50-year-old Harare man who died at Wilkins Infectious Diseases Hospital, eight days after his first symptoms appeared.
The man had returned from Britain and started showing symptoms on Wednesday last week. He alerted the local Rapid Response Team, which went to assess him at home and collected samples for testing, which proved positive the next day.
Meanwhile, President Mnangagwa expressed gratitude to well-wishers for their support at State House yesterday after receiving donations from companies and universities. He also urged Zimbabweans to play their role in the fight against the deadly pandemic.
“We are grateful for the support that you are providing; this is what makes Zimbabwe a solid nation even in bad times or good. I think we will emerge from this pandemic stronger.
“It is important that every individual and every organisation contributes to the mobilisation of equipment that would be used by the Ministry of Health and Child Care in fighting this pandemic,” President Mnangagwa said.
The President assured the nation that every donation would reach its intended destination and that everything received was being documented.
Relatedly, Government has established, a COVID-19 National Disaster Fund dedicated to receive and account for contributions from Development partners and well-wishers, with a view to ring fence them for deployment to address and mitigate the effects of such adverse occurrences.
Despite inadequate resources, Zimbabwe continues to do its best in curbing the spread of the novel coronavirus by putting in place measures pronounced by World Health Organisation (WHO).
Government has since set aside over ZW$600 million to cover one million vulnerable households under a cash transfer programme for the next three months, to mitigate the impact of COVID-19.
So far Government has identified and assessed seven more potential COVID-19 testing centres in Harare and a similar process is ongoing in Bulawayo and eight other provinces to decentralise testing and to allow more testing should it be necessary.
