#COVID-19: Gabon Records Drop In Infections

Gabon is witnessing a drop in the COVID-19 infections rate in the country since April 28, with a 2.3 per cent positivity rate as of Monday, May 10.

“The epidemiological follow-up of the COVID-19 pandemic in our country indicates a drop in infections during the second wave which continues to be confirmed on a daily basis,” Dr Guy-Patrick Obiang Ndong, the country’s Minister of Health said.

He added that “proof of this is the fact that the number of new cases, the number of patients in reanimation and that of those dead has progressively reduced.”

“We have passed from 170 new contaminations per day to about 70 new infections daily,” the minister revealed, adding that the national vaccination campaign against Covid-19 would be extended to the six remaining provinces of the country.

Gabon has so far been carrying out vaccinations in the provinces of Estuaire, Haut-Ogooue, and Ogooue-Maritime. 

The six remaining provinces to be tackled now are Moyen-Ogooue, Ngounie, Nyanga, Ogooue-Ivindo, Ogooue-Lolo, and Woleu-Ntem.

The minister, however, said that this favourable evolution in the infection rate in the country should not be synonymous with a drop in prudence and called on his compatriots to continue to respect the measures put in place to prevent an occurrence of a third wave.

“We are faced with a smart virus and we have to be extremely prudent in the management of this pandemic,” he declared before revealing that as of May 10, 133 new  positive cases had been declared in seven of the nine provinces of the country out of 5,688 tests carried out in eight provinces, which is a positivity rate of 2.3 per cent.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, 754,964 tests have been carried out in Gabon with 23,565 positive cases recorded and 20,051 cases successfully treated and 143 deaths.