Africa's Top Health Official: "The Pandemic Response Phase Ends with Lockdowns"

John Nkengasong, Director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) [Photo by Reuters]

[Asia Economy Reporter Cho Hyun-ui] John Nkengasong, Director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), stated on the 6th (local time) that the era of responding to the pandemic by strengthening lockdowns is over.

At a press conference that day, Director Nkengasong expressed encouragement at how South Africa successfully managed the recent infection wave driven by the Omicron variant, according to major foreign media reports.

The Africa CDC is an organization under the African Union (AU), which comprises 55 countries in the region and oversees the continent's health issues.

After detecting Omicron in late November last year, South Africa did not strengthen lockdown orders but relied on existing preventive measures such as mask-wearing, and the wave peaked within about a month. Accordingly, curfews that had been in place for nearly two years since the pandemic began were recently lifted.

Director Nkengasong said, "We were very encouraged by what we saw in South Africa during this period," and asserted, "The time to use strict lockdowns as a tool to prevent the spread of the coronavirus is over."

He added, "Now, with increased vaccination, we need to practically consider using public health and social measures in a more cautious and balanced way."

However, he expressed concern that if the scale of vaccination does not expand this year, COVID-19 could become endemic in Africa.

According to the Africa CDC, the current COVID-19 vaccination rate on the continent is only 14.14% partially vaccinated and 9.47% fully vaccinated out of a population of 1.3 billion.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.