BY NQOBANI NDLOVU
An initiative by Bulawayo residents to fight the coronavirus pandemic has described the 21-day lockdown as a total failure, saying government only focused on deploying the army and police instead of practical steps to stop the spread of the virus.
A tale of government lies, material and financial resource constraints, and lack of coronavirus or Covid-19 isolation and treatment centres has been the hallmark of the lockdown, hampering the fight against the disease.
With government failure against fighting Covid-19 in the public glare, the local business community, individuals, and churches, among other stakeholders, have come together to complement the state’s wobbling efforts against fighting the disease as Bulawayo emerged as a hotspot.
The “I-am-4-Bulawayo-Fighting Covid-19” initiative seeks to mobilise as much as US$10,7 million while the Citizens Covid-19 Monitor , another local platform, is also working towards the same as “reality” sinks in among residents that a “solution” is urgently needed to save lives.
“What we needed was a World Health Organisation-approach where they recommend a lockdown combined with widespread and decentralised testing, effective contact tracing, and well-oiled awareness campaign machinery,” said Effie Ncube, the Citizens Covid-19 Monitor communications manager.
As of Friday, few people had been tested for Covid-19 throughout the country.
“This is where the lockdown in Zimbabwe failed. We have arrested more people than we have tested during the lockdown,” Ncube said.
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“Without extensive testing combined with massive community-centred awareness, you can have a 10-year lockdown, but still fail to contain the disease.”
Bulawayo only started Covid-19 testing on Monday at the National TB Reference Laboratory at Mpilo Central Hospital.
All along, Covid-19 testing was done at the National Microbiology Reference Laboratory at Sally Mugabe Central Hospital in Harare, hampering the fight against the global pandemic at a local level.
The Bulawayo citizens’ initiative efforts are majoring on ensuring the quick capacitation of Ekusileni Medical Centre, Thorngrove Infectious Diseases Hospital and Mater Dei Hospital turning them into fully-equipped Covid-19 testing, isolation and treatment centres.
As the government decides on extending or reviewing the lockdown, the Bulawayo Citizens Covid-19 Monitor urged authorities to copy countries such as Singapore and South Korea that “did not just lock down”, but used that opportunity to “deploy science against the disease”, not the security services.
“They deployed comprehensive measures that included contact tracing, isolation, quarantine, effective treatment and awareness.
“Those that failed just relied on a martial approach to a medical issue like what Zimbabwe has largely done,” Ncube said, “In our case as Zimbabwe, we went against Covid-19 with a well-equipped army and police and poorly-equipped health workers and health facilities.
“We had more bullets than testing kits, more machine guns than ventilators, more tanks than health care centres.
“It was a wrong approach that has failed elsewhere and that will not succeed here either.”
Bulawayo had recorded 10 cases of coronavirus with one death as of Friday.
