A member of the Ugandan Olympic squad has became the first athlete to test positive for Covid-19 on arrival in Japan for the competition due to start on 23 July.

The event was postponed last year, but now will go ahead despite fresh wave of Covid-19 cases in Japan.

Uganda is also experiencing a surge in cases, which forced the government to tighten lockdown measures on Friday.

The Ugandan, who is part of nine-member squad to the Olympics was fully vaccinated, according to reports.

The group – which included boxers, coaches, and officials – tested negative before leaving Uganda.

However, one of them tested positive when they arrived Tokyo Narita airport on Saturday, and is currently quarantined at a government-designated facility, local media quote Japanese officials as saying.

The rest of the squad traveled by chartered bus to Osaka, in western Japan, where they will train ahead of the Games.

The Ugandans are the second group of foreign athletes to arrive for training ahead of the competition. Australia women softball squad arrived on 1 June.

Foreigners who want to travel to watch the Olympics are banned. On Monday they will take the decision on whether to allow domestic spectators.

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This travel update is part of the revised Covid protocols that United Arab Emirates [UAE] authorities released on Saturday 19 June.

This means United Arab Emirates flights connecting Nigeria, South Africa, India will resume from this date, according the Dubai media office.

The Dubai Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management issued the new travel protocol.

Travellers from Nigeria will be required to do COVID-19 tests upon arrival at the airports in United Arab Emirates, with this new guidelines.

With this development Emirate airline has relaxed their previous suspension of arrivals from Nigeria, South Africa and India.

What’s in the new Dubai Nigeria travel rule?

Passengers from Nigeria to Dubai:

1. Passengers must have received a negative test result for a PCR test which they took within 48 hours before departure. UAE citizens are not affected.
2. Passengers need to show a negative PCR test certificate with a QR code from labs approved by the Nigerian government.
3. All passengers must undergo one PCR test when they arrive in Dubai airport.
4. Transit passengers need to comply with entry protocols of their final destination.

Requirements for passengers from South Africa to Dubai:

1. Passengers need to receive two doses of one covid-19 vaccine approved by UAE authorities.
2. Passengers must present a negative test result of one PCR test which they took within 48 hours before departure. UAE citizens are exempted.
3. All passengers must undergo one PCR test when they arrive in Dubai airport.
4. Transit passengers need to comply with entry protocols of their final destination.

Requirements for passengers from India to Dubai:

1. Eligible passengers travelling from India to Dubai also need to present a negative test certificate from one RT-PCR which they took 48 hours before departure; UAE nationals are not required to follow this requirement.
2. Passengers travelling to Dubai from India are required to do rapid PCR test four hours before departure to Dubai. They must also undergo another RT-PCR test on arrival in Dubai.
3. Upon arrival, passengers from India are required to undergo institutional quarantine until they receive their PCR test result, which is expected within 24 hours.
4. United Arab Emirate [UAE] citizens and diplomats are exempted from the institutional quarantine. Also, only QR-coded negative PCR test certificates is acceptable.

The UAE’s new measures are a part of efforts to ease travel restrictions into Dubai.

According to the Dubai media office, the protocol will become effective from June 23, 2021.

Emirates Airlines reaction

“Emirates welcomes the latest protocols and measures announced by the Dubai Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management to allow the safe resumption of passenger travel from South Africa, Nigeria and India to Dubai and onwards.”

The airline’s spokesperson said in a reported statement, according to Golf News.

“We will resume carrying passengers from South Africa, Nigeria and India in accordance with these protocols from 23rd June,” Emirates said

“We thank the Supreme Committee for their continuous efforts in monitoring the development of the situation.

“And announcing the appropriate guidelines and protocols to protect the community and safeguard the travel sector,” the Airline reported statement add.

“When Emirates will resume flights to Nigeria?”

According to the Dubai media office, the flights will resume effective from June 23, 2021.

Emirates had suspended passenger flights from India effective until July 6, 2021 due to rising Covid infections in that country.

Meanwhile United Arab Emirates will suspend travellers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Namibia from entering the Middle East county on national and foreign flights.

The suspension will take effect from 23:59 p.m. on Monday, June 21, state news agency WAM reports on Saturday.

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The measures are to begin by 10 pm local time on 18 June.

In a televised speech broadcast on Friday night, Museveni announced that all private and public transport in the country are banned for the next 42 days.

The exception are essential services and goods that need to move from place to place.

The current restrictions resembles the one of March last year when the entire country went into full lockdown.

Museveni says the measures are needed to counter the current community transmission and reduce the work hospitals and clinics are doing to manage patients.

Entebbe International airport and other land borders will remain opened to tourists and those returning, but authorities not allow people who have the virus or the variant to enter the country.

All work that the government considers to be non-essential, like schools, places of worship, and sports events will be suspended for 42 days.

Business centers and trading areas will closed down and shop owners can sleep in their shoip if they want.

In the last twelve days alone, the country recorded 15,800 cases and 190 deaths.

Just 6.6% of the 869,000 people who have received a vaccine injection are full vaccinated.

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The centre’s director-general Chikwe Ihekweazu announced the discovery at Monday’s joint briefing of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19.

The new strain, B.1.2.5 which is different from the highly infectious B.1.1.7, has not been described as a variant of concern yet, he said.

He said that researchers and scientists were still working hard to understand if this variant had any effect on the virus’ transmissibility, immunity, as well as diagnostics, vaccines and therapeutics.

As of Monday’s briefing, Nigeria has confirmed 54 cases of the B.1.1.7 COVID-19 variant in the country.

The B.1.1.7 COVID-19 variant was first detected in the UK and has spread to over 80 countries around the world.

Iheakwazu said the cases were found between November 2020 and February 2021.

At today’s @PTFCOVID19 briefing, DG @Chikwe_I spoke on the ‘B.1.525’ variant recently detected in Nigeria

“The ‘B.1.525 is yet to be classified as a variant of concern until it is associated with any significant clinical impact” pic.twitter.com/dqGRHOfkCP

— NCDC (@NCDCgov) February 22, 2021

Ihekweazu said: “As we shared, a total of 54 cases with the B.1.1.7 variant strain, which is a variant of concern first described in the UK have been detected in Nigeria.

“There is a new variant, the B.1.2.5 which we have begun to detect in Nigeria and 15 other countries. It is important to note that this variant has not been described as a variant of concern yet.

“Researchers and scientists are still working hard to understand if this variant has any effect on the virus transmissibility, immunity, as well as diagnostics, vaccines and therapeutics.

“This is because the variant has some similar mutations with the B.1.1.7, B.1.351 and P.1 variants first detected in the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil, respectively.”

The NCDC boss said that the agency was scaling up its sequencing capacity to have a better understanding of the burden of variants of concern in the country.

He said that the risk of virus mutation was higher when there is a high transmission of the virus.

He concluded: “While sequencing is important for us to understand the situation, hand-washing, physical distancing and the proper use of face masks are very important to prevent the spread of the virus.”

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Nigeria is seeing a surge in Covid-19 case, some state governments have banned large gatherings and also ordered the shut down of event centres and clubs.

These were measures taken before the federal government ordered a nationwide lockdown in March.

Nigeria, like most of Africa, has been spared the full devastation of the coronavirus pandemic, but experts are now saying the country is in the second wave of the pandemic.

In a tweet on Monday, Ahmad hinted at the possibility of another restriction of movement.

🔒⬇️ 2.0

— Bashir Ahmad (@BashirAhmaad) December 21, 2020

According to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country are 78,434 — while 68, 303 have been discharged.

On December 17, a total of 1,145 cases were recorded in a single day — the highest daily toll ever.

Lagos remains the worst hit with over 26,700 cases. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, governor of the state, has contracted the virus and he is currently being treated.

Globally, over 77 million COVID-19 cases have been recorded out of which more than 1.7 million infected patients have died.

Several countries have imposed another round of lockdown to contain the spread of the virus.

On Monday, the Saudi Arabian authorities suspended international flights for a week over a new strain of COVID-19.

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According to data from the NCDC, the number of deaths increased from 1,212 recorded on Friday to 1,218 on Saturday.

Nigeria, like most African nations, has been spared the full devastation of the coronavirus pandemic, but experts worry this second wave could devastate the continent.

The country recorded its highest number of daily deaths from COVID-19 on June 16 — with 31 people dying of complications from the infection.

Since then, the number of daily deaths has fluctuated, and in some days, no deaths at all were recorded.

The NCDC also confirmed a total of 920 new cases in 17 states and the federal capital territory (FCT).

This was an increase, from the 806 new cases recorded on Friday.

This is also the third-highest daily figure recorded in the country with the highest being 1,145 recorded on Thursday.

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The governor who announced this on Friday evening blamed the spike in COVID-19 cases on “an unfortunate public perception” that the virus has been defeated.

Experts say Nigeria is witnessing a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic. On Thursday, the recorded over 1,000 new cases of the disease, out of which Lagos had 459 infections.

The governor, who is currently being treated for COVID-19, said night clubs, religious centers, and other social events have continued with disregard for COVID-19 guidelines.

“Dear Lagosians, this overwhelming non-compliance with guidelines meant to keep us all safe is very disheartening, especially when we consider that the message at the heart of Christmas is one of sacrifice and sacrificial conduct; embodied by the Holy Bible in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life,” he said.

“Christmas is a commemoration of this supreme act of sacrifice by God. The least we can do in this Season is to emulate that spirit of sacrifice, by abiding with difficult but necessary protective guidelines, for the greater good of all of us. This is certainly not the time to lower our guard against the Coronavirus; it is instead time to step up our battle against this stubborn virus that has gripped the world for several months now.

“Concerts, carnivals and street parties are banned in Lagos State until further notice. Night Clubs have not been allowed to open yet. All Night Clubs in Lagos must immediately shut down, until further notice.”

He added that schools will remain shut while public servants in grade level 14 and below will work remotely for the next two weeks.

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He said this in a short message posted on Twitter, on Wednesday.

In the video, he claimed, “for a hundred years, we couldn’t find a vaccine for cancer. for over forty years we are yet to find any vaccine for HIV AIDS. for over another hundred years research has been going on to find a vaccine for diabetes, we are yet to find a vaccine.

“How is it possible in one year they found a vaccine for Covid 19?”

Senator Melaye further made the unsubstantiated claimed that “those who took the vaccine died within three days.”

He ended the video with a call to African leaders not to allow their citizens to be used as guineapigs by developed nations for “satanic reasons.”

“we will hold the minister of health responsible if any vaccine is used on any Nigerian and there is a concomitant negative effect”, he concluded.

Say no to Covid 19 Vaccine. pic.twitter.com/1eoRdvB45l

— Senator Dino Melaye. (SDM) (@_dinomelaye) December 16, 2020

Back in May, Dino Melaye shared the conspiracy theory that Covid 19 was caused by 5G networks, and he urged the Nigerian government to resist the wide use of the technology.

Melaye’s current theory is coming at a time when Nigeria is witnessing a second wave of coronavirus pandemic. So far, Nigeria has recorded 74,123 cases of the disease. While 66,494 patients have been discharged, 1,200 people have died.

On Tuesday, The Nigeria Centre For Disease Control (NCDC),said the country registered 758 new infections in a single day.

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When Covid-19 was just starting to sweep the globe, experts predicted Africa would be devastated, with millions of lives lost. But 11 months later, the continent seems to be doing better than anticipated.

The United States with a population of about 326 million people, has so far recorded over 228,000 deaths from the coronavirus, while the entire continent of Africa has recorded just over 41,000 deaths.

Researchers have found no reason to believe that Black people have a natural immunity to the coronavirus, despite some pseudoscience that has circulated about African Americans in the US. The trend in Africa stands in stark contrast to the experiences of Black people in America, who, due to a range of other socioeconomic factors, are at a disproportionally higher risk of becoming ill from the coronavirus.

But why has Africa been so successful at controlling the coronavirus pandemic?

Experience with other epidemics

Experts say some African nations’ experience with previous viral outbreaks like Ebola means it was already prepared to deal with Covid-19.

In 2014, Nigeria led several West African states to contain the outbreak of Ebola by perfecting public health measures which include isolating the infected, tracing their contacts, and then getting them quarantined while they get tested.

Favorable climate

A study conducted by researchers at the University of Maryland USA found a correlation between temperature, humidity and latitude, and the spread of Covid-19.

Muhammad Sajadi, the lead researcher opined that the virus had an easier time spreading in lower temperatures and humidity.

“Not that it does not spread in other conditions – it just spreads better when temperature and humidity drop,” he said.

Youthful demographics

Africa is home to the world’s youngest population with a median age of 19 years, according to UN figures.

Globally, most of those who have died have been aged over 80.

“The pandemic has largely been in younger age groups.. about 91% of Covid-19 infections in sub-Saharan Africa are among people below 60 years and over 80% are asymptomatic,” said the World Health Organization (WHO).

 Early action

Scientists highlight that what is likely behind Africa’s low caseload is, first and foremost, the fact that most countries implemented draconian protective measures very early on.

The country of Lesotho even imposed a nationwide lockdown before they had a single case.

It declared an emergency and closed schools on March 18, and went into a three-week lockdown about ten days later.

But only days after the lockdown was lifted, did Lesotho find its first confirmed cases. In a population of more than 2 million, the country has so far recorded about 1700 cases and 40 deaths.

Underdeveloped transport system

The underdeveloped transport systems within and between African countries appear to have been a blessing in disguise. It means that Africans do not travel as much as people do in more developed countries, minimizing contact among people of different countries.

Furthermore, Nigeria – Africa’s most populous country has had its borders with neighboring countries including Benin and Niger closed to curb smuggling and boost local production. This measure which has been in place since August 2019, appears to have significantly reduced contact among different people in West Africa.

The low number of coronavirus in Africa is not just down to luck, it shows that with individual action, and following public health measures, Covid-19 can be controlled.

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