May 22, 2020(Nyamilepedia) — A briefing by the US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Tibor Nagy on U.S. Support for Combating COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa reveals that the Republic of Tanzania has stopped providing COVID-19 statistics.
Responding to a series of questions particularly on Tanzania and South Sudan’s efforts to combat Coronavirus Nagy confirmed that Tanzania has stopped providing reports on Coronavirus from April 29, 2020.
“On Tanzania, yes, it’s very disappointing. Allegedly, according to their statistics, they stopped providing any more COVID statistics as of April 29th, and so obviously there are much greater numbers since then. ” Nagy said,
“Dar es Salaam, we don’t know exactly what the situation is there. I mean, our embassy is doing its best to take surveys and see what’s happening, but unfortunately the government there is just not being very transparent with the entire process.” Nagy continued,
The US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs believes that the Tanzanian government is reopening up the country to make a few dollars from tourisms and other sectors.
“Also, I think the Tanzanian Government is taking steps to try to reopen everything.” Nagy said.
“Obviously, they are very concerned with the economic impact that the loss of the tourism industry is going to have on them, but I can’t imagine any tourists flocking back there in such an uncertain environment.” Nagy continued.
From the beginning, Tanzania barely closed her borders compared to other countries as president John Magufuli believes that his people would rather die from Coronavirus than leaving them to die of starvation in their houses.
Like many other African countries, Tanzania does not have any budget to support her population like many western countries are doing to their citizens who are quarantined at home to prevent COVID-19 from spreading.
Many African countries, which do not have enough ventilators, are facing critical shortage of medical supplies as many hospitals are overwhelmed by the rising number of cases arising from COVID-19..
