The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) on Friday (Nov. 26) urged African health authorities to intensify COVID-19 prevention measures amid the emergence of a new variant that World Health Organization classified as a “variant of concern.”
The Africa CDC made the call a day after the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) in South Africa announced the detection of a new variant, B.1.1.529, of the SARS-COV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19 pandemic.
READ MORE: B.1.1.529 tagged variant of concern, travel ban expansion mulled
“National health authorities across the continent should reinforce public health and social measures and accelerate immunization of their populations, prioritizing high risk groups, ahead of upcoming new waves of COVID-19 infections,” the agency said in a statement.
It called on African countries to expedite their COVID-19 vaccination drives to halt the spread of the virus, saying “vaccines remain a key tool to prevent severe cases and deaths from COVID-19 infection.”
The agency underscored the need to reinforce timely genomic surveillance through coordination with national and regional pathogen genomics laboratories.
As of Saturday, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Africa has reached 8,616,912 with 222,301 deaths and 8,064,499 recoveries, according to the agency. (Xinhua) – jlo
