Experts have lamented the attitude of Africans towards the Covid-19 pandemic.
They said less than half the people interviewed about the disease believed they faced the risk of contracting the virus.
Also, more than 60% believed that COVID-19 could be prevented by drinking lemon or taking vitamin C. And just over 40% believed that Africans could not get COVID-19.
They stated this at the on Thursday, during a webinar hosted by the African Centre for Diseases Control and public strategy firm, Gatefield, to help journalists improve their reporting around the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dr Emmanuel Agogo of the Resolve to Save Lives, said even though Africa’s COVID-19 numbers have been lower than the rest of the world, it was important to identify the common trends, issues and attitudes across the phases of the outbreak.
“Outbreaks and pandemics come in various phases. We need to keep vigilant. COVID-19 will hit rural areas and villages later than urban centres,” he said.
He added that Resolve to Save Lives was an initiative that has been funded to look at the COVID-19 response.
He further stated that about 73% thought that a hot climate prevented the spread of the virus and 61% believe that avoiding a person who has recovered from COVID-19 prevents them from getting it.
According to him, this was dangerous, because it meant they were less likely to follow public health measures advice because they did not think they would be affected.
“The study found 4 in 5 respondents anticipated that COVID-19 would be a big problem in their states. But, their personal risk perception for contracting the virus was low.
Agogo advised journalists to focus on four lenses when they reported on the pandemic. These lenses are lives, livelihoods, liberties and the long term. These were the lives that were affected, the impact on people’s livelihoods, the liberties of people as well as the long-term effects that it would have.
Principal communicator at the Africa CDC, James Ayodele said that the continent had adopted a continental operations strategy that hoped to conduct 10 million COVID-19 tests in Africa, deploy 1 million community health workers, train 100,000 health care workers by the end of 2020 and set up a procurement platform on the CDC’s site to help supply member states with the necessary health equipment.
