The African continent has surpassed 2 million confirmed cases as health officials warn of infections starting to creep up again into a second wave.
The African Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said on Thursday that the continent had crossed that milestone. Its figures show that the 54-country continent has also seen more than 48,000 deaths from COVID-19.
The 1.3 billion people of the African continent are warned of “preventive fatigue” as countries loosen pandemic restrictions to alleviate the suffering of their economies and more people travel.
The Africa CDC director openly worried this week that the degree of masking has dropped and called it dangerous.
“We do not know how high the second peak will come,” John Nkengasong said on Monday. While the world takes hope from the latest news about promising COVID-19 vaccines, African health officials are also worried that the continent will be hit when richer countries buy up supplies.
Several African countries have confirmed virus cases in the six figures. South Africa leads with more than 750,000, while Morocco has more than 300,000, Egypt more than 110,000 and Ethiopia more than 100,000.
Kenya is the latest problem as it now sees a new rise in cases. At least four doctors died alone on Saturday, leading a powerful health association in the country that threatened a nationwide strike beginning next month.
The African continent has conducted nearly 20 million coronavirus tests since the pandemic began, but the shortfall means that the true number of infections is unknown.
