By Simon Deng
South Sudan’s national ministry of health with support from the World health Organization and UNICEF announced plans of intensifying COVID-19 vaccination in flood-prone counties in a press conference on Sunday.
“On 18 April, 2022,we will have a second Phase of intensified COVID-19 vaccination activity organized by WHO together with the ministry of health, and UNICEF and other partners where we hope to vaccinate over 465,000 people in 7 days in 21 counties in Lakes, Warrap, Unity, Jonglei and Upper Nile states,” said Sacha Bootsma WHO Covid-19 incident manager.
Bootsma said that the health ministry together with partners are working towards integrating COVID-19 vaccination within the routine immunization program, noting that 596 health facilities are currently vaccinating against covid-19 across the country.
“We want to go there before the rain starts, in Lakes, the counties are Awerial, Rumbek East, Cuiebet and Yirol West, in Warrap state, we have Gogrial West and gogrial East, Twic and Tonj North, in unity state, Pariang Mayom, Panyijiar, Guit, in Jonglei state, Bor South, Twic East, Duk and Pibor Administrative area and in Upper Nile state, Maban, Baliet, Manyo, Pashoda and Akoka,” she said.
John Rumunu, the Covid-19 Incident manager in the national health ministry said that the testing has expanded, noting that the ministry has distributed antigen rapid diagnostic test to several health facilities.
“Our testing have expanded beside PCR test in Public Health Laboratory and private laboratories in Juba, mobile laboratory in Nimule, we have gene expert sites in all the states and administrative areas, we have at least 39 gene expert sites in the country and also we have distributed Antigen Rapid Diagnostic Test to number of health care facilities,” said Rumunu.
Bior Kuer Bior, the manager for the Public Health Emergency Operation centre said that the data it’s receiving from the various centers across the country from the tests is accurate, noting that the test is performed on travelers and alerts across the country
“We try as much as possible with the testing sites in all the states to make sure that the numbers we are getting from them are accurate, We have no reason to doubt the data that we are getting, one thing that we should be very clear about is that the people that are tested are either people who are trying to travel or alerts, we have not done general testing to know exactly what is happening,” said Kuer.
South Sudan has confirmed 8 new cases in the last 24 hours and that brings the cumulative number confirmed to date to 17, 286, the cumulative number of recoveries are 13,514 and the total cumulative number of deaths remains at 138.
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