TWO people both aged 83-years-old have died after being admitted following a positive test for COVID-19.
The two, a male and female of Ndola and Kasempa respectively were admitted to Ndola Teaching Hospital (NTH) and Kasempa District Hospital.
Minister of Health Sylvia Masebo has since cautioned and advised members of the public to adhere to COVID-19 precautionary measures as the pandemic is currently on the increase.
Ms Masebo noted that the country, since May 16th, this year has recorded 1,504 cases compared to 195 recorded cases in the preceding three weeks, showing an increase in the pandemic.
“Our test positivity rate over the last two weeks has averaged at five percent. further highlighting this increase. Sadly, we have lost two patients to COVID-19 within the past week, after having not recorded any lives lost to COVID-19 in over 74 days. One of the deceased is an 83-year-old man who was admitted to Ndola Teaching hospital and demised on 11th June 2023 and the other also 83-year female who was admitted to Kasempa District Hospital and demised yesterday,” she said.
Ms Masebo in giving a ministerial statement in parliament today said following a matter of Urgent Public Importance raised by the Member of Parliament for Katombola, Mr Clement Andeleki, she noted that the country has an increased trend of COVID-19 cases since May 16th, 2023.
“We have recorded 1,504 cases,compared to only 195 cases recorded the preceding three weeks. This clearly shows an increasing incidence of cases. In the last 24 hours alone, Zambia recorded 178 new cases out of 2,320 tests done representing a daily positivity of eight percent,” she said.
Ms Masebo said the new cases were reported across 31 Districts in six provinces being Copperbelt 69 cases out of 385 tested, Luapula nine out 124 tested, Lusaka 29 out 460 tested, Muchinga five out 129 tested and North-westem 15 out of 892.
She noted that Southern Province had 51 out 310 and Western zero out of 37 tested.
“Currently there are 794 active cases, 12 of whom are admitted to hospitals in Lusaka, Copperbelt and North- western provinces. We admitted seven new cases in the last 24 hours,” she said.
Ms Masebo noted that of the patients currently admitted, only one patient is classified as critical.
“Of the admitted, three are vaccinated against COVID-19. Madam Speaker. We have not recorded any new COVID-19 variant. The Zambia National Public Health Reference Laboratory reported that out of the 57 samples sequenced, all the cases are of the Omicron variant,” she said.
She said that the rise in cases may be attributed to the cold weather, a season associated with increasing respiratory infections.
Ms Masebo explained that while the Government has not put up any restrictions, we encourage those not yet vaccinated to do so and be protected from severe COVID-19 disease.
She further called on people to mask up and practice hygiene practices such as washing of hands and use of sanitisers and further encouraged those that are not vaccinated to get the vaccine and also the booster shot.
(Mwebantu, Friday, 16th June, 2023)
