The United States government says that it is committing approximately R8 million to the South African government in response to the coronavirus or COVID-19 outbreak.
The financial support will come through the United States Agency for International Development or USAID.
South Africa has 17 positive cases of the virus.
Speaking on Morning Live, the USAID Acting Mission Director in South Africa, Natasha de Marcken says, “The US Agency for International Development has a humanitarian assistance mandate which we take very seriously along with our mandate to save lives, as we are facing globally this pandemic around COVID-19. The United States is committed to supporting South Africa as well as the global response to the epidemic.”
”The United States government has been very impressed with the response by the government of South Africa particularly in terms of information sharing and transparency in looking at how the epidemic is going to be addressed here in South Africa,” Marcken adds.
In the video below, Natasha de Marcken discusses the financial support to South Africa:
Mkhize, health authorities
Health authorities in South Africa will meet with Health Minister Zweli Mkhize on Thursday afternoon, to discuss how the country will respond to the World Health Organisation’s declaration of the coronavirus as a pandemic.
The United Nations health agency announced the declaration on Wednesday night. The term pandemic relates to a geographic spread and is used to describe a disease that affects a whole country or the entire world.
More than 121 500 people have been infected by the coronavirus across the world and 4383 have died.
Deputy Director-General in the Health Department Doctor Yogan Pillay says, “It means that globally the world will have to be on higher alert and countries might have to increasingly take more extreme measures to both isolate patients, put patients into quarantine and restrict movement. So once we’ve had a discussion with the minister, the minister will make some additional announcements.”
EXPLAINER: How coronavirus reached Africa:
Italians are coming to terms with a national lockdown to contain the deadliest outbreak of coronavirus outside China.
It includes a ban on all public events, the closure of schools and public spaces and the suspension of religious services. A 6pm curfew came into effect last night.
Italy has more than 10 000 coronavirus cases and 630 deaths so far.
