- President has permitted the opening of businesses
- He has also reduced curfew time
- Mental Health and Psychosocial considerations during the COVID-19 Pandemic
South Sudan President Salva Kiir has been criticized for lifting previously imposed restrictions to curb the spread of coronavirus.
In a statement, President Kiir permitted businesses to reopen. This includes bars, eateries, restaurants, rickshaws, etc.
The President, who also heads the nation’s High-Level Taskforce on Covid-19 also reduced the curfew time from the previous 7 pm to 6 am to start from 10 pm to 6 am.
Yesterday, the country recorded 30 new cases that brought the total number of confirmed cases to 120.
The South Sudan Doctors’ Union criticized the President’s directive saying it was ill-timed and would direly hurt the people of South Sudan.
SSDU believes that easing restrictions would encourage transmission to areas where health professionals are not trained and where facilities are not available to quarantine positive cases.
The country’s national health ministry’s spokesman Dr. Thou Loi emphasized that the nation risks having a full-blown case of the virus since the nation’s High-Level Taskforce on Covid-19 was not working in harmony with the technical team.
“I advise that there is need to continue restrictions, continue testing people leaving outside Juba and those coming in-country from COVID-19 affected countries so that we prevent the importation of more coronavirus cases,” said Dr. Thou.
The spokesperson of the High-Level Taskforce on Covid-19, Dr. Makur Koriom, was, however, unable to explain why the task force had made the directives.
He said:
The move was a decision made by the President Salva Kiir, who is also the chairman of the taskforce. Well, with criticisms from the public and activists, we are happy to listen to those concerns and they will be made available for the president.
