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Lia Tadesse, Ethiopia’s new health minister, talks to the Thomson Reuters Foundation about the measures being implemented to keep the country safe.
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By Emeline Wuilbercq
Lia Tadesse became Ethiopia’s health minister in mid-March, the day before the East African nation recorded its first case of the new coronavirus.
As the pandemic takes hold in Africa (Ethiopia has 140 cases and neighboring Kenya more than 450), Tadesse spoke to the Thomson Reuters Foundation about the race to protect refugees, women and other vulnerable people from the virus.
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Are you concerned that Ethiopia’s fragile health system may soon be overwhelmed?
If we have a lot of cases, and more serious cases, that will definitely overwhelm the system. We are seeing this happening, not only in Ethiopia, but throughout the world.
We are preparing to the best of our ability: increasing the capacity of our intensive care unit and dedicating more ventilators to treatment facilities in Addis Ababa and other regions.
The fans we have are still low, around 221 for COVID-19, but we hope to get more soon.
We are working with countries to secure more aid.
Is there a risk that prohibition great gatherings and imposing Will social distancing exacerbate social inequality?
As we try to prevent COVID, we don’t want people to die from other problems. The government is preparing social protections.
Most companies and large projects continue to maintain the economy and daily workers.
The government is supporting vulnerable people affected by the measures by distributing food across the country.
The deployment of thousands of community health workers across the country to educate and evaluate people who work?
It’s in progress. We started this recently, so we hope it really supports our COVID response.
Early detection is a key point for mitigating the epidemic.
These health workers wear masks and gloves and conduct house-to-house surveillance to identify possible symptoms such as fever and cough and to establish people’s recent travels.
Health workers are also identifying people who have other diseases but who have not sought medical attention for fear of the COVID epidemic.
Can girls and women access sexual and reproductive health services?
Initially, our communication focused more on COVID-19 awareness, but now we are also communicating key services such as reproductive health.
Community health workers make sure that women are aware that these services are available and that some such as family planning can be accessed in their homes.
Throughout the country we are educating on harmful practices such as female genital mutilation and gender violence. It is a priority.
Are you concerned about Ethiopia’s ability to contain the disease in refugee camps?
Refugees and internally displaced persons are one of the vulnerable populations with whom we are working.
We are working with different partners, such as the Agency for Refugee and Returned Affairs and the UN migration agency to ensure that these communities have the necessary health assessment and that we keep them safe through measures such as hand washing.
This interview was shortened and edited for clarity.
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