The Congolese government announced that it had detected a first case of the new coronavirus on its territory, in Brazzaville, in a press release broadcast on the night of Saturday to Sunday.
With seven deaths in 280 cases, mainly in Egypt and the Maghreb, according to an AFP count drawn up from official sources at 9 a.m. on Sunday, Africa has so far been much less affected than the rest of the planet.
First official cases in sub-Saharan Africa
But more and more countries in sub-Saharan Africa have reported their first contamination in the last 48 hours.
In Brazzaville, the first confirmed case is "a 50-year-old French-Congolese national, arrived in Congo on March 1, 2020 from Paris by Ethiopian Airlines flight ET861, after a brief stay in Amsterdam", according to the press release read on public media by government spokesperson Thierry Moungalla.
Tested positive on Saturday by the National Laboratory of Public Health, the patient is in stable condition and "the members of his family: his wife of French nationality as well as their daughter aged 6 years have been isolated and are under permanent surveillance", according to the text.
The government, which says it is continuing to identify people who approached the patient, invites all passengers who have taken the same flight to "contact the health services as soon as possible".
Quarantine for all passengers from risk areas
This first case appeared ten days after the Congo decided to impose a quarantine on all passengers from countries at risk, including France, a measure which has not been applied.
In addition, in the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo, where a first case, a Congolese living in France who arrived on March 8, was diagnosed this week, two new cases were recorded, bringing the number of people affected by Covid to three. 19.
The French consular school in Kinshasa has decided to close "until further notice" after the announcement of one of these two new cases, "a relative of one of our teachers", announced the high school in a press release .
- epidemic
- Congo
- Africa
- Coronavirus
- Health