Coronavirus watch: AU member states train experts on Covid-19 prevention and control

Since the beginning of the outbreak, Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CD) has trained hundreds of experts from African Union Member States in different aspects of Covid-19 prevention and control, including laboratory diagnosis, enhanced surveillance and point of entry screening, infection prevention and control, risk communication, and case management.

Africa CDC also provides additional kits for 1 000 tests to any country that reports cases.

The WHO and US CDC provided additional test kits to some of these countries to strengthen their capacity to test for the virus.

For Member States that do not yet have the capacity to conduct the test, Africa CDC is facilitating their linkage to the closest capacitated laboratories within the continent.

We have trained them on how to transport specimens across the border and we are monitoring how they do this to ensure the quality of tests conducted. Some of the countries are now conducting genomic sequencing of confirmed cases in their countries with support from Africa CDC.

As the outbreak continues to evolve, the risk of other African countries detecting new cases of Covid-19 remains high.

Africa CDC will continue to work with Member States and partners to harness and maximise use of the limited resources available on the continent. Our goal is to rapidly detect, contain and minimise any harm to populations in Africa. — Dr John Nkengasong Director, Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.