US diverts resources to fight Covid-19 in Africa

People wearing masks and walking on the streets. The state department has diverted resources towards the fight against Covid-19. PHOTO BY RACHEL MABALA.

The US State Department has approved the diversion of military medical personnel and equipment intended for peacekeeping and counter-terrorism operations in Africa towards the fight against Covid-19 on the continent.

This has been done under the African peacekeeping rapid response partnership, a programme by the State Department which aims to promote peacekeeping operations by institutionalising security forces’ enabling capabilities like medical care and engineering,

Other beneficiary countries of the Covid-19 assistance include Senegal, Ghana, Rwanda, Chad, Malawi, Mauritania, and Burkina Faso.

Under the arrangement, the US assistant secretary of state for political and military affairs, Mr Clarke Cooper, told Daily Monitor last week that a mobile hospital has been set up at Bombo barracks which handles any medical procedure relating to the coronavirus.

“We took a lesson from the 2014 Ebola outbreak and realised that resources do not need to sit on the shelf, especially in times of crisis,” Mr Cooper said during a phone interview. “We are not talking about significant long-term care but at least offer a broad range of care to ease pressure on the otherwise would be overwhelmed medical facilities.”

Mr Cooper further revealed that the State Department had notified Congress last month about the arrangement, to operationalise it, and had received considerable bipartisan support.

“The US has a long standing engagement with the UPDF and that is where we are coming from. So a contribution like a hospital is not something new; it is a continuation of our military cooperation,” he said.

The hospital in Bombo offers less care than a general hospital but more than a typical emergency room. Tents, 20 inpatient beds (cots), ambulances, and other essential equipment have already been set up. It has also been equipped with four ventilators, an intensive care unit, radiology lab, and an operating room.

Mr Cooper also praised Uganda’s Covid-19 response system of quick testing and tracking the virus through the Uganda Virus Research Institute, which is still reinforced by the US government through the Centre for Diseases Control and their huge funding to the health sector that amounts to $500m (Shs1.8trillion).

Mr Cooper also stated that the latest State Department intervention is not a dig at Beijing, amidst the ongoing US-China tensions over the coronavirus whose worldwide cases have clocked 5 million and at least 328,000 deaths recorded by press time yesterday, but said it is not as the US is known to have long standing military cooperation with many countries including Uganda.

The State Department says Uganda has received some $3.6m (Shs13b) in health assistance to address the Covid-19 outbreak and nearly $1.3m (Shs4.8b) in migration and refugee assistance to support refugees and host communities in Uganda.