Repackage Covid-19 message to the public

With the increasing Covid-19 deaths and cases in Uganda, particularly in Kampala, panic and fear have engulfed the country.

Strangely, while many people are living in fear, others have taken the pandemic situation as an opportunity to make quick money by venturing into risky businesses.

Right now, many Ugandans are under scare of this pandemic, but are very scared to take tests due to the way the initial cases were handled. When the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in Uganda, too much fear was instilled in the public using different messages.

Worse still, whoever would be suspected to have the virus or tested positive, he or she would be rounded up immediately and isolated from the rest of the public in a very frightening way. This caused fear in many to go for testing or even reporting themselves in case they showed symptoms.

Immediate response is good but the manner in which it is carried out matters a lot given the nature of our communities. The patients, even after recovering from the pandemic, still complain of being stigmatised in the communities they live in as some people shun them and their families due to the scare of contracting the virus even when there is no chance of infecting others.

Government institutions, especially the Health ministry, should reconsider their message packaging and how to relay it to the public. They must also find a way of persuading the public to test voluntarily, which will help the authorities to know the right number or estimates of cases of infections in the country, hence plan accordingly.

The government should also avail more testing services free of charge to the less privileged communities or groups of people like the unemployed, elderly and other groups that most likely can’t afford the Shs240,000 for testing.

I know the government and particularly the Ministry of Health are somehow strained by these costs. Therefore, at least they should either find a way of subsidising it so that the ordinary Ugandan pays like a quarter and government meets the rest of the cost. But also, let these costs apply to organisations and corporate companies.

The high cost of testing is more likely to lead the country into a calamity as many people will ignore the testing and wait until signs start to show, a situation that can expose the public to the virus.

My appeal to government is that they should either subsidise the cost so that ordinary Ugandan pays less and government tops up the cost or continue testing at no cost for the peasants or the poor.
Meanwhile, members of the public should continue to wear masks, wash their hands or sanitise regularly to keep healthy.

Robert Owen,
[email protected]