The government is enforcing mandatory quarantine for Kenyans suspected to suffer from Coronavirus. The worst hit are the hustlers flying in from the Middle East where some work as Watchmen (Security, remember Jowie? yes his ex colleagues), house-helps and those working in hospitality industry -hotel/restaurants.
Big question to Uhuru, does the government have a budget for fighting Coronavirus? on what are we spending the billions from donors that was granted to fight the pandemic? are we buying medical essentials like protective gear for health care workers? are we buying ventilators to be used in hospitals just in case shit hits the fan like the case in Italy or New York? Are we expanding bed capacity? what happens when we get about 1000 patients in a rural Kenya who need admission and ICU facilities?
Let the eloquence of Mutahi Kagwe not distract Kenyans, effective communication alone will not help, we need a 360 degrees approach. Government should start by appropriately budgeting for the pandemic, allocate the donors funds to cater for things like quarantine costs, this is a very small cost that will go a long way to help patients coup. Seal loophopes on possible pifrage of such funds, we are Kenyans, we are not new of some of the monkey business in Jubilee regime. Remember El Nino funds? buying dildos in Waiguru office? oh yes, we have been there.
Can you imagine that a Kenyan flying home from Rwanda where he works as a street hawker is forced to go for quaratine where the hotels designated as quarantine facilities are charging as much as Ksh.12,000 per day??
Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe had announced that those coming into the country beginning Sunday night to Wednesday, March 25 will undergo mandatory quarantine at their own expense.
Read below a report by Citizen TV
A Kenyan citizen held at the Kenya School of Government — one of the State’s designated quarantine facilities — revealed that neither safety nor logistical measures had been put in place to facilitate the isolation.
According to our source, as at 5pm on Monday, there were about 400 individuals at the facility and they required to share rooms; some in groups of at least seven people.
Even more, there were no personal protective equipment including adequate sanitizers to ensure high hygiene standards.
The individuals were being transported from the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in National Youth Service buses which began picking arriving passengers as from 3am.
Individuals quarantined at the Kenya School of Government had been asked to pay 40 US dollars (Ksh.4,000) per day before the amount was lowered to 20 US dollars per day after the group raised concerns.
Similar issues were witnessed at the Utalii college where we understand accommodation facilities were inadequate despite hundreds of individuals being moved to the facility for quarantine.
Later on Monday, in a press briefing on the state of the coronavirus in the country, Health CS Mutahi Kagwe acknowledged the logistical challenges and apologised to all the affected individuals, assuring that everything would be set in order.
“I want at this point to issue an apology to the parents and individuals who have been so inconvenienced since last night. We are aware that we had logistical challenges that we encountered as a result of the speed at which we wanted to move into quarantining individuals,” said Kagwe.
The Health CS pleaded with the hotels offering the quarantine services to reduce the charges as part of their Corporate Social Responsibility.
“I want to thank those hotels that have already admitted the quarantined people but we are appealing to you… these are people who came to the country without a plan to spend money in a hotel. If your normal charges are Ksh.12,000 in a hotel room you should not be charging more than 50% or 25% of that,” said Mutahi Kagwe.
“So we are urging you to reduce the rate as part of your Corporate Social Responsibility.”
He disclosed that individuals will henceforth be given the option of being quarantined at a hotel or government designated facility after touching down at the airport, adding that more arrivals are expected.
The quarantined individuals are expected to remain at the various facilities for 14 days
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