As rich nations struggle, Africa’s virus response is praised

[Morrison71]

https://chinapost.nownews.com/20200922-1828795

The coronavirus pandemic has fractured global relationships. But as director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Nkengasong has helped to steer Africa’s 54 countries into an alliance praised as responding better than some richer countries, including the United States.

A former U.S. CDC official, he modeled Africa’s version after his ex-employer. Nkengasong is pained to see the U.S. agency struggle. In an interview with The Associated Press, he didn’t name U.S President Donald Trump but cited “factors we all know.”
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While the U.S. nears 200,000 COVID-19 deaths and the world approaches 1 million, Africa’s surge has been leveling off. Its 1.4 million confirmed cases are far from the horrors predicted. Antibody testing is expected to show many more infections, but most cases are asymptomatic. Just over 33,000 deaths are confirmed on the continent of 1.3 billion people.

“Africa is doing a lot of things right the rest of the world isn’t,” said Gayle Smith, a former administrator with the U.S. Agency for International Development. She’s watched in astonishment as Washington looks inward instead of leading the world. But Africa “is a great story and one that needs to be told.”
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Nkengasong urges African countries not to wait for help and rejects the image of the continent holding a begging bowl. The money is there, he said.

Acting on that idea, Africa’s public and private sectors created an online purchasing platformto focus their negotiating power, launched by the African Union to buy directly from manufacturers. Governments can browse and buy rapid testing kits, N95 masks and ventilators, some now manufactured in Africa in another campaign endorsed by heads of state.
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“I look at Africa and I look at the U.S., and I’m more optimistic about Africa, to be honest, because of the leadership there and doing their best despite limited resources,” said Sema Sgaier, director of the Surgo Foundation, which produced a COVID-19 vulnerability index for each region. She spoke even as Africa’s cases were surging weeks ago.

 

[Titanhawk2]

Not reopen a possible sore subject, but isn't that anti-malaria drug widely used in Africa?

 

[LetsGoHawks83]

What has been better about their response?

The article I found says they do far less testing. But in doing antibody testing, they have found that a large number seem to be asymptomatic to the point of considering just letting the virus reach herd immunity

Science | AAAS

www.sciencemag.org

Maybe... Just maybe the individuals in their population have better immune responses to the virus? Maybe other viruses that have been present in their society that prepared their immune systems for this? What are the demographics of africa? Do they have a comparable elderly population and obesity rates?

 

[hexumhawk]

Maybe it has something to do with the generational usage of hydroxychloroquine for malaria?

 

[hawkedoff]

Or maybe they are not testing anything really at all and it is much more widespread than anyone knows or cares.

Sort of like India.

 

[coloradonoles]

Pretty easy to keep the number of confirmed deaths down when you don't test anyone and call every death a Covid death.

 

[Run&Blade]

Obesity ?

 

[hawkeyetraveler]

I have not had time to look up the demographics, but my hypothesis is that age distribution accounts for a major portion of the difference. Sadly, people in Africa die younger on average, so I suspect you do not have as many 65+ year olds as a percentage of the population.

 

[hawkedoff]

I have not had time to look up the demographics, but my hypothesis is that age distribution accounts for a major portion of the difference. Sadly, people in Africa die younger on average, so I suspect you do not have as many 65+ year olds as a percentage of the population.

Could be. In parts of Africa they still burn people as witches. Let that sink in a bit and then think about how things like the coronavirus would be tested and treated.

 

[BelemNole]

Or perhaps it's a continent that has experience with pandemics and people don't pretend it's fake.

 

[hawkedoff]

Or perhaps it's a continent that has experience with pandemics and people don't pretend it's fake.

Sure..

 

[Whiskeydeltadeltatango]

If you change "rich" with "Obese and sedimentary" this headline makes a ton of sense in the real world.​