"Covid-19 cases in Kenya will soon reach 10,000 and our hospitals will be overwhelmed by patients." These are the not very comforting forecasts of the Kenyan Ministry of Health, on the eve of the introduction of the rapid swabs that it has finally taken possession of.
With the rapid tests, which will be provided to hundreds in each county defined as "at risk" and of which there will be massive use in the coming days in the capital Nairobi, the number of suspicious cases and direct contact of the 179 positive will be followed several times and, from projections already made in the past (it is from the first five cases that almost all the current ones have arrived) the number could soon be multiplied by thirty.
"By the middle of the month we could already have five thousand cases in the country and by the end of April we hope not to exceed ten thousand - said the Head of the Health Department, Mercy Mwangangi - because our health facilities will not be sufficient to accommodate all - Our projections are valid for the next few weeks and can only be confirmed after the first mass rapid tests".
In order to avoid congestion, which may also represent further outbreaks of contagion, the Department relies on home care protocols for patients with mild symptoms.
It has to be said that only one of the 179 cases of Coronavirus positivity detected so far in Kenya is defined as "worrying" and the patient is in intensive care with ventilator support.
The other 178 are referred to as "mild or moderate".
This should not lower one's guard, but rather increase prevention, because only by protecting oneself can prevent the infection from reaching the weakest and most disadvantaged people. That perhaps they still do not realize that all this, perhaps for the first time really in this country, is also being done for them.
In the next 24 hours more information will be communicated on how the Ministry of Health intends to act on it.