30% rise in infections among Emiratis, health minister says
Al Owais attributes increase to family gatherings and says challenge is not over
There has been a 30 per cent rise in new Covid-19 cases among Emiratis due to increased family gatherings, Abdul Rahman Mohammad Al Owais, Minister of Health and Prevention, said yesterday.
Positive indicators such as high recovery, low infection and a low fatality rate does not mean the challenge is over, Al Owais said, stressing the importance of social distancing and other safety protocols.
The UAE yesterday reported 239 new cases after 50,729 tests along with 354 recoveries and one death.
Global cases top 19m
Meanwhile, global cases yesterday passed the 19 million mark and deaths rose to 713,660 as a surge in cases in Spain, Germany and France dented Europe’s hopes of a rapid recovery.
WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said
yesterday that global economic recovery could come faster if a vaccine is made available to all.
India infections cross 2m
Cases in India breached the two million mark yesterday. On July 28, India had recorded 1.5 million cases. The 500,000 more cases came in nine days, at an average of 50,000 a day.
It begins with a mild fever and malaise, followed by a painful cough and shortness of breath. The infection prospers in crowds, spreading to people in close reach. Containing an outbreak requires contact tracing, as well as isolation and treatment of the sick for weeks or months.
This insidious disease has touched every part of the globe. It is tuberculosis, the biggest killer infectious disease worldwide, claiming 1.5 million lives each year.
Until this year, TB and its deadly allies, HIV and malaria, were on the run. The toll from each disease over the previous decade was at its nadir in 2018, the last year for which data are available.
Yet now, as the coronavirus pandemic spreads around the world, consuming global health resources, these perennially neglected adversaries are making a comeback.
“Covid-19 risks derailing all our efforts and taking us back to where we were 20 years ago,” said Dr. Pedro L. Alonso, the director of the World Health Organisation’s global malaria programme.
Lockdown woes
It’s not just that the coronavirus has diverted scientific attention from TB, HIV and malaria. The lockdowns, particularly across parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America, have raised insurmountable barriers to patients who must travel to obtain diagnoses or drugs.
According to one estimate, a three-month lockdown across different parts of the world and a gradual return to normal over 10 months could result in an additional 6.3 million cases of tuberculosis and 1.4 million deaths from it.
Several public health experts, some close to tears, warned that if the current trends continue, the coronavirus is likely to set back years, perhaps decades, of painstaking progress against TB, HIV and malaria.
The Global Fund, a publicprivate partnership to fight these diseases, estimates that mitigating this damage will require at least $28.5 billion, a sum that is unlikely to materialise.