25 Business premises in Lusaka closed due to non-compliance to COVID-19 measures

25 Business premises in Lusaka were closed due to non-compliance to COVID-19 measures that were recently put in place to curb the spread of COVID-19.

The premises that include bars, night clubs and wholesale liquor outlets were closed either for failure to operate within required operating standards or did not adhere to provided COVID-19 guidelines.

Ministry of Health Permanent Secretary Technical Services Dr Kennedy Malama said the multi-sectoral team would continue with closures and prosecution as part of the response.

And Zambia in the last 24 hours has recorded 67 new deaths with Lusaka recording the highest at 20 followed by Eastern province with 16 deaths.

Dr. Malama expressed concern over the number of deaths and new infections coming out of Eastern province saying the province is too small to be recording such high numbers.

“When you look at the past 2 weeks, Eastern province has been having the highest positivity and we are very concerned as a response with Eastern province.” Dr. Malama said.

He said the province has been recording high numbers of new cases, severe cases, and deaths.

“We’ve engaged authorities in Eastern province to ramp up preventive interventions. Dr. Malama added.

And Dr. Malama said out of 6485 tests conducted in the last 24 hours, 1619 new confirmed cases were recorded representing a positivity rate of 25%, he added that of the 67 deaths recorded, the majority of people that died did not die of any underlying conditions but the disease itself.

“Most of these are developing acute pneumonia with respiratory complications, in other words, they are not able to breathe.”Dr. Malama said.

He added that most of the patients that are dying in the facilities are those that have been brought to health facilities late and it is too late for health workers to do anything to help the situation.

“We should learn from the people that we are losing that we cannot fight COVID-19 in the hospital, that is why we are shocked to see people still wanting to operate bars, still wanting to go around unmasked.

He showed concern that people insist on wearing masks incorrectly such as only covering the mouth, putting the mask in the neck (contaminating the mask) among other wrong ways of wearing masks.

“We are seeing people keeping patients at home, some who are severely sick and they only call for help when it is too late, there are some changes in the human body, once those occur, it is irreversible, and we are dealing with COVID-19, once there’s permanent damage to the lungs and other vital organs you cannot reverse them,” Dr. Malama said.