Health experts worry over Covid-19 isolation violations

Sukulwenkosi Dube-Matutu, Chronicle Reporter
HEALTH experts have raised concern over Covid-19 patients who are flouting home self-isolation regulations and move around in public places.

They said they have received reports of incidents where some Covid-19 patients leave their homes and mingle with the public after being instructed to self-isolate at home.

Due to limited space at isolation centres and an upsurge of Covid-19 cases, patients with mild conditions self-isolate at home.

In an interview, Bulawayo City Council director of health services, Dr Edwin Sibanda said rapid response teams were supposed to constantly check on patients that are under self-isolation but not all were reached because of resource constraints and limited personnel.

He said each patient who is instructed to self-isolate at home is issued a contract and those who breached it were handed over to the police.

Dr Sibanda said there were some cases where Covid-19 patients did not have the capacity to self-isolate at home and these were referred to designated homes. He said so far Bulawayo was relying on Elangeni Training Centre and plans were underway to secure more space.

“Self-isolation means that one has to accept that they are Covid-19 positive and then take responsibility of the health of others by secluding themselves so that they don’t infect others. Unfortunately, there are some people who go out to public spaces while under self-isolation and start interacting with other people thereby risking to infect others,” he said.

“As a city response team when we place patients under self-isolation, we issue them with contracts which they sign.

The contracts will be stating the terms which patients have to abide by when under self-isolation. If we hear of any who breach the contract, we hand them over to law enforcement agents. We have some cases that we have referred to the police. When we place people under self-isolation, we also hand over their names to the security forces under the rapid response team.”

Matabeleland South Provincial Medical Director, Dr Rudo Chikodzore said it was difficult to make follow ups on all patients under self-isolation especially during the peak of the wave. She said a Covid-19 positive person is supposed to isolate for 10 days from the day of diagnosis and then discharged if s/he is asymptomatic even without a retest. Dr Chikodzore said if the patient remains symptomatic after 10 days s/he must remain in isolation for three more days.

“A room or house which meets conditions for self-isolation should have a separate entrance, good ventilation, running water, separate bathroom and toilet from the other users. During self-isolation an individual shall remain confined to the isolating room and put on a face mask when moving outside the room during the isolation period.

The isolating individual is also supposed to use separate utensils,” she said.

“Because of current capacity issues, those with mild conditions are home isolated if their home is suitable. If not suitable that’s when institutional isolation in community isolation centres is considered. If we are doing follow up as health teams and we do not find someone at home who is supposed to isolate we alert law enforcement.”

Dr Chikodzore said the response to Covid-19 requires a multi-stakeholder approach under which various ministries have a role to play. She said the community also has a role to play in enforcing Covid-19 regulations and people must report those violating regulations.

Matabeleland South based health practitioner Dr MacDonald Hove said isolation was the separation of people with contagious or infectious disease from the rest of the population to limit or interrupt transmission. He said those who were discarding self-isolation rules were most likely spreading the virus. He said it was important for people to exercise self-discipline and responsibility for the fight against Covid-19 to be successful.

“That’s why it’s important for everyone to protect themselves from the next person by masking up, sanitising and maintaining social distancing as they won’t be knowing the condition of the next person. A person might appear well while they are infected with Covid-19 and under self-isolation period,” he said.-@DubeMatutu