By Sarah Mlozoa
Malawi has finally received a donation of 38,000 testing kits for Covid-19 pandemic.
Co-Chairperson of the Presidential Task Force on Covid-19 Dr. John Phuka said 10,000 have been donated by the African Union (AU) while 25,000 test kits have arrived from Europe.
Dr. Phuka said this means that the country will resume its normal testing which was suspended a few days ago due to limited testing kits.
Meanwhile the country has recorded 153 new cases in the past 24 hours bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 3,302 with four new deaths.
Of the new cases, 148 are locally transmitted infections and five are imported infections. Of the locally transmitted infections, five are healthcare workers from Kasungu, Likoma and Mzuzu, 84 from Blantyre, 23 from Mzuzu, 16 from Lilongwe, 14 from Nkhata Bay, two from Chiradzulu, one each from Chitipa, Dowa, and Neno.
Cumulatively, Malawi has recorded 3,302 cases including 76 deaths. Of these cases, 915 are imported infections and 2,387 are locally transmitted.
1,282 people have now recovered bringing the total number of active cases to 1,944. So far 25281 COVID-19 tests have been conducted in 39 COVID-19 testing sites.
However Dr. Phuka emphasized that people must not go for testing if they do not have a known COVID-19 contact, unless if they have COVID-19 symptoms saying it remains the responsibility of the healthcare workers to determine who to get tested.
