PRESIDENT Hage Geingob says Namibia was never expecting to be in the situation it is now experiencing due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The country is facing the worst as a result of the pandemic, which has claimed close to 1 200 lives in Namibia to date, Geingob said during a visit to Katutura Intermediate Hospital and Windhoek Central Hospital, where he assessed the availability of oxygen, yesterday.
“We have the worst of the situation here. We never expected it,” Geingob said.
Namibia recorded 1 084 new coronavirus infections from 2 597 test results in the last 24 hours, which represents a 42% positivity rate.
Geingob said winter might be aiding the rapid spread of the virus during the third wave of increased infections which the country is currently experiencing.
The president explained that his visit to the state hospitals resulted from a Cabinet meeting yesterday morning, during which options on how to deal with a lack of beds, facilities and oxygen in health facilities in Windhoek were discussed.
“We are pleading with you, for your own safety,” Geingob said to people who continue to be reckless and contravene the health regulations aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus.
The minister of health and social services, Kalumbi Shangula, escorted Geingob to a newly installed 20-tonne oxygen tank at the respiratory unit of the Katutura Intermediate Hospital.
They also visited an additional oxygen generator installed at Windhoek Central Hospital, which is expected to operate from this afternoon.
The hospital initially only had oxygen supplied by the company Intaka Technology Namibia, which has been providing hospitals countrywide with oxygen since 2011.
The newly installed generator, which pumps about 370 litres of oxygen per minute to the hospital’s Covid unit, was built in two weeks by African Gas Solution and funded by the Social Security Commission.
To deal with the lack of available beds for Covid-19 patients, the health ministry has prepared 64 additional beds at Katutura Intermediate Hospital, near the hospital’s nurses home, Shangula said.
The additional beds have already been filled as patients continue to flood to the hospitals for medical attention.
According to Monday’s Covid-19 figures announced by the health ministry, 516 patients are hospitalised with Covid-19 in Namibia, 262 of whom are in Windhoek. Of the 516 patients, 90 are being treated in intensive care units.
As a result of private and state hospitals not having sufficient beds to admit all severely ill people, patients have been waiting at home in hope of getting an open bed in any facility, and some have travelled as far as Rundu to get space in a hospital.
Shangula explained that Namibia and India had similarities in terms of their level of preparedness when it came to addressing the Covid-19 situation, particularly with regard to oxygen supplies.
According to media reports, medical oxygen in India had been in severe shortage as the country was battling increasing Covid-19 infections.
A number of hospitals in that country ran short of oxygen, with patients scrambling for oxygen cylinders, sometimes in vain. The Namibian reported this month that Namibia was almost in a similar situation as India, with healthcare workers left to make life and death choices.
Shangula explained that the oxygen issue was not the responsibility of the government, with hospitals at all times having had oxygen supplies, but suddenly the number of patients needing hospitalisation, subsequently oxygen, has increased.
“Well, we were in the same situation as India. When India started a little bit earlier, we followed suit. What we never anticipated is not the level of infections, but the level of patients who need oxygen, since last year in March,” he said.
He said the need for oxygen has placed pressure on the available supply from the private sector, who has come to a stage of exceeding their capacity.
“Now they have to import from outside to supply to us,” Shangula added.
Windhoek-based infectious disease specialist Dr Gordon Cupido yesterday warned that the third wave of the pandemic would kill hundreds if not thousands of people if the trend observed currently continues.
“People must leave home only for essential activities and completely stop all social events,” he urged.
Cupido also last week told The Namibian that Namibia’s measures to recall doctors and nurses and temporarily set up additional infrastructure to accommodate the influx of Covid patients was not enough.
He believes that Namibia is on the ascending limb of the pandemic curve, which means everyone who has been infected in the past week or two weeks will still come into hospitals in the next week or two.
“I’d say this for the following reasons: patients are not being admitted to oxygen-providing beds to the extent that they require. Our ICUs are full.
“Our oxygen supply is strained and even patients who are on oxygen in hospital are often not receiving adequate oxygen because the supply is not sufficient,” he said.