Five more people have succumbed to Covid 19 related ailment as the country registered the highest number of fresh infections ever reported in a 24 hour period after 389 tested positive to the deadly viral disease.
The latest deaths now bring to 159 the number of fatalities registered and a cumulative figure of 7577 people so far infected since the outbreak of the highly contagious disease was confirmed in the country.
Health cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe in a signed statement on the status of the pandemic expressed fears that the disease if not checked could easily overrun our health facilities going by the soaring numbers of new infections and fatalities.
“We have lost too many lives already, we cannot afford to lose we must renew our commitment to observe the containment measures without which this disease could overrun our health facilities” he said.
He was however pleased to inform the nation that 88 more patients fully recovered from the disease bringing the national tally on recoveries to 2236 but reminded Kenyans to strictly observe the containment measures to avert further spread of the disease.
“The simplicity of these containment measures makes them very easy to ignore and some of our people have literally abandoned them yet we have no choice but to obey to stop the spread of the disease” the CS regretted.
He said incorporating collective campaign was critical especially now that the disease burden was in thousands and the deaths in hundreds to ensure that the curve was flattened.
Kagwe said todays’ new infections were derived from 4829 samples taken for testing during the last 24 hours in which only three out of the 389 positive cases were foreign nationals.
He said the gender disaggregation of the new cases were 266 males and 126 females with the youngest being 1year old and oldest at 93 years of age
He said Nairobi still topped the list of counties with highest numbers at 248 fresh cases followed by Kajiado with 36, Kiambu 27, Mombasa 23 Busia 17 Machakos 10, Migori 9, Kitui 6 while Makueni and Uasin Gishu had three cases each.
By Wangare Ndirangu
