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Western Cape not prepared for Coronavirus

A friend in Mauritius told me as from Thursday afternoon the Mauritian government imposed restrictions including that people must stay home for two weeks. All shops are closed except supermarkets and pharmacies.

Thursday morning everything was fine, but it's only after three(?) local Covid-19 infections were reported that restrictions were announced that afternoon. Until then citizens lacked official information and still don't have much information - what to do, etc - because government is not communicating well. By yesterday there were 19 infections and one death.

Mauritius' slow response is typical of how non-Asian countries including South Africa reacted to the virus' rapid spread - it's a "Chinese virus" denialism. Now they're reacting too late and panicking. They didn't learn from China's and later South Korea's, Taiwan's and Singapore's experience: lockdown, tracing and testing.

The Guardian writes: "The first coronavirus cases in Taiwan and Italy came only 10 days apart. On Sunday [March 15] Taiwan, which has deep cultural and economic ties to China, recorded just 153 cases and two deaths. Italy has more than 47,000 cases and 4,032 people have died."  Also see here.

For South Africa, the entire nation was negligent, especially government and media. Only over the past two to three weeks did they begin giving it the attention it deserves. All along it was "we're all right", it's a Chinese issue. I'm not saying this with hindsight but have been saying so for almost two months. 

Like the west, President Ramaphosa only acted last Sunday - three months after the outbreak in Wuhan - after he was given projections of the virus' possible spread and deaths if the country did not take immediate action.  Experts from Stellenbosch University, using data from Wuhan and flu modelling, predicted responding slowly and inadequately could cause from 87 900 to 351 000 deaths and overwhelm the health system.

However, the measures Ramaphosa announced don't include lockdown and social distancing. Schools are closed until Easter and the number of people are limited at gatherings to 100, and asked to keep one metre apart from each other. Municipal services have been limited. That's it.

But people are going to work and buses and trains running. Roads and shopping centres are busy as usual. Compare this to the situation around the world. The government is waiting for the first few deaths before they take necessary action.

The DA-run province and Western Cape Health Department are not prepared. There are only two public health facilities where people can get tested - Tygerberg and Mitchell's Plain hospitals. Testing limited to those who display symptoms and have have come into contact with people who were in index countries. It doesn't account for community infections.

I believe Tygerberg has the only Covid-19 isolation unit in the province.

Premier Alan Winde, interim DA leader John Steenhuisen and DA crow about how well they're doing. But Winde and WCHD's coronovirus website give call centre numbers - national and WC - if patients suspect they have the virus. Have you ever tried calling a government call centre?

The majority of the WC's population are poor so how will they get tested. They can't afford the R1400 private rate. There's no roll-out of free testing as in other countries. There are good examples SA could follow, South Korea and Australia included. But it appears they choose the UK's and US' tardy, confusing and leaderless approach where especially the US is woefully unprepared. This also is typical of the ANC.

If it gets worse and infections rise, the public health situation in the WC will be bad. Already WCHD are inefficient, 50/50 incompetent and fail the people they serve. And they're not proactive and won't take advice.

The province probably reflects the national position. The country is in for a tense, scary and potentially life-threatening few months.

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