Amid terrifying reports that all the gains we have made as a nation and people aimed at curbing the spread of Covid-19 may just be eroding, and that there is a surge of the Coronavirus, with the discovery of a new variant of the virus in Liberia, health authorities have announced that dozens of people tested positive for the virus are on the run.
Authorities announced here last week that as the country experiences a new variant of the Covid-19, the variant B117, which was first detected in the United Kingdom in December of 2020, 138 unnamed and unidentified individuals tested positive for the virus have very mind-bogglingly disappeared.
According to health authorities, Covid-19 cases have exponentially increased in the country, with Montserrado accounting for the highest in progression since the first wave of the Coronavirus onslaught in May last year.
As at last Sunday, 13 June, health authorities reported that Liberia currently has 31 confirmed cases after testing 211 samples. Out of these 31 confirmed cases, 26 were outgoing travelers, and authorities say the index case of the new variant has no recent travel history.
Authorities disclosed that cumulatively, the country has now confirmed 2,484 cases after testing 111, 939 samples from the onset of the outbreak; dating back to January 2021 to present, a total of 566 cases are confirmed.
That’s why, in response to all these, the news of some 138 Covid-19 patients being on the run, is not only very unpleasant but worrisome.
We from the Women Voices newspaper are worried, and moreover, are left bewildered by the action of these individuals, who are not just risking their lives, but are also putting others at risk, and endangering the whole country; a one already struggling with matters of effectively managing its health care delivery system.
Consequently, we call on the absconding Covid-19 patients to do the morally right thing by immediately turning themselves in to health practitioners for early treatment; and quit the denial or whatever reason(s) prompting their escape – as their continued evasion of proper health care and intermingling with unaffected persons pose a huge danger of the already swelling cases ballooning beyond imagination, even to the point of overwhelming our fragile health system.
We also call on family members, loved ones and friends of any of these escaping Covid-19 patients, to, in the interest of all and sundry, report to the relevant authorities the whereabouts of these individuals, as a “stich in time, saves nine.”
