Coronavirus is infecting more men than women in Uganda

A graphical presentation of cases in Uganda for 34 weeks shows that more adult males in Uganda have been reported positive for coronavirus than females and children.

The data and statistics found in the Covid-19 Response Info Hub website shows that only 71 females aged 20-29 contracted the virus while 268 males in the same age bracket also tested positive. Only one positive female in the age bracket of 80-89 tested positive for the virus.

The least affected male were adults aged 70-79 years while children aged zero to nine years for both sexes were less than ten cases.
The statistics are consolidated by the government of Uganda to categorise cases of coronavirus reported in the country into the response hub that gives updated information about the situation; the statistics are placed on the Response Info Hub website. The statistics plus other resources about the virus can be found on the Ministry of Health and Kampala Capital City Authority websites too.

According to Dr Monica Musenero, an epidemiologist and the Presidential Advisor on Covid-19 pandemic, there is no clear research to show why there are more men than women who have tested positive.

The case of truck drivers
But she alludes to Uganda’s having many cases recorded from truck drivers.

“Majority of our first cases were truck drivers most of who are men and that went on for quite a long time. The numbers then accumulated. I am not sure that there are many female truck drivers. The men will remain the majority,” said Dr Musenero.

She added: “If you want to know how the disease is spreading out in the community, you have to remove the truck drivers and look at the data without the truck drivers then you know whether in the community we are also having more men. However, globally it has been known that more men are severely affected compared to women. Even more men die, compared to women. It is a question that we are still researching on."

Dr Musenero said there is also an observation that women are more careful in their lifestyle compared to men but there is a need to study the trend, data and prevalence in the community to be able to tell whether there are more men than women infected by coronavirus in Uganda.

Imported vs local cases
Uganda reported the first case of Coronavirus on March 21st, 2020 and had the first death on the 23rd week. The interactive graphs, charts and maps show that Uganda’s coronavirus cases were more prevalent as imported cases. The trend in imported and local cases started changing from week 22 when there were 155 imported cases while local cases were 87.  Week 23 saw the change in trend with more local cases, 111, reported, compared to 73 imported ones.

This trend of infection has continued to date with local transmissions rising as imported cases drop.
By week 34 (this week), Uganda had recorded 760 local cases (95 per cent) and 42 (five per cent) imported cases.

For now, most of the cases are asymptomatic and not in critical conditions that require intensive care.
The Response Info Hub website that was last updated on August 25, shows that Uganda has cumulative 1,712 local cases accounting for 67.8 percent and 813 imported cases accounting for 32.2 percent of the total 2,525 cases. 282,859 people have so far been tested for coronavirus in Uganda.

Ministry of Health records as of Thursday shows that there are 2,524 cumulative positive cases, 26 deaths and 1,268 recoveries.

With the increase in local transmissions in different parts of the country, Ugandans expected a new lockdown but there was no address by the president locking down the country again. Ministry of Health advised people to take personal responsibility to be safe and save the healthcare system from being overwhelmed with patients.