Health officials are now working with Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF) as country ports of entry remain porous risking citizens lives with the widely spreading coronavirus; sources in the health sector at the Wilkins quarantine facility have revealed.
Harare City Council, City health director, Dr Prosper Chonzi revealed the role of United Nations agencies including the World Health Organisation (WHO), which is spearheading on protective wear and equipment and UNICEF which is training staff, in responding to the epidemic.
“We have MSF (Doctors Without Borders), normally they come on board, if we have an outbreak of this nature, they help us in actually logistics and actual management they bring in to complement our staff,” Chonzi said. (sic)
“Internally, we are also working closely with this time the defence forces where we have to train the army, the airforce and all so that we have one big team to respond.”
Although the Wilkins facility managed to convince the Parliamentary Portfolio on Health on preparedness, the Robert Mugabe International Airport showed signs of unpreparedness to fact-finders who fear that a coronavirus patient may get into the country undetected and risk the health of Zimbabwean citizens.
Parliamentary Portfolio Committee Chairwoman on Health and Child Care Ruth Labode who was on the fact-finding team, soon after touring only managed to say that the largest airport in Zimbabwe is porous against the control of the coronavirus pandemic.
Labode complained that authorities working at the airport are disjointed to work together and control the pandemic from spreading into Zimbabwe.
The fact-finder also raised the issue of equipment, after discovering Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) workers using wrong masks to protect themselves, with some not even having the protective wear.
Officials at the Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport responded to Labode’s risk concerns by revealing a PSMAS clinic to use for quarantining suspected coronavirus patients.
A Port Health Authority official said the airport has an emergency team dedicated to dealing with the coronavirus threat.
ZIMRA officer said the taxman had no foreign currency to purchase the required masks which are in short on the local market.
