At Signpost International we continue to work and communicate with all of our communities throughout the world during this global pandemic. We want to keep you up to date with the current Coronavirus situation in the countries and communities we work in.
At the time of publishing (1:30pm on Friday 1st May 2020) this is the current situation in the countries we work in.
Uganda
There are now 83 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Uganda and no confirmed cases in the communities we work in.
The country remains in lockdown till Tuesday 5th May when President Museveni will announce whether the lockdown will be extended or lifted.
We want to thank you, our Global Neighbours for supporting our most recent appeal. Two weeks ago we shared our, help build community resilience appeal. The appeal focused around supporting the communities we work in to help stem the spread of COVID-19. We explained due to government enforced lockdowns we are limited to what we can practically do through our local partners. This means that so far our main response to Covid-19 has been in Uganda, with other smaller efforts in our other countries of operation.
This week we received an update from our partners in Uganda, VAD, who are carrying out the work on the ground. Despite the country being in lockdown they were able to secure permission from the relevant authorities to continue their work as it is acting as an emergency response to Coronavirus.
VAD gave us this update this week on our response to the pandemic in the communities we work in.
“ We have distributed 20 hand washing stations each with 135 liters of water to 20 selected sites. We were able to hire a public address system that was used to verbally disseminate information related to hand washing at all times and other dangers associated with COVID19. The information was disseminated into local language. The team procured PPE (face masks and gloves) for the staff and contact people in the community, these PPEs helped to protect implementers. The communities that have received the hand washing stations are extremely grateful to everyone who is helping them.”
Pictures of the communities receiving the hand washing stations.
Tanzania
There have now been 480 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Tanzania and 16 confirmed deaths, with no confirmed cases in the communities we work in.
This week the Government of Tanzania came in for criticism after 4 days of silence on COVID-19. On Wednesday, the Government ended that silence and announced that confirmed cases of the virus had risen by 69% in 5 days.
The Prime Minister has also been criticised for urging people to keep working as usual. Schools and Universities remain closed but marketplaces, shops, public transport and places of worship are all operating as normal.
The Philippines
There are now 8,772 confirmed cases of the virus with a death toll of 579 in the Philippines.
There have been no confirmed cases in the neighbourhood of West Habog Habog where we work. West Habog Habog is a neighbourhood in Iloilo city and today the local government of the city confirmed that there have been 9 confirmed cases of the virus and one death. They also announced that they are working towards the accreditation of three more hospitals as COVID-19 testing centres. The city is still in extended enhanced community lockdown but this is to be reviewed again next week.
Please do continue to pray for all of the Countries and communities we work in throughout the world.
