Alarm as Kisumu tops in Covid cases again

For the second time in a week, Kisumu yesterday topped the list of new Covid-19 infections, signalling faster spread of the disease in the lakeside county.

Yesterday, the county recorded 103 cases, after having registered 102 infections on Tuesday.

Seventy of those cases were from Kisumu Central. Nairobi was the second county yesterday in new infections with 62 cases.

Kisumu’s new infections were part of the 573 cases recorded yesterday from 5,798 samples.

With the number of those admitted to hospitals countrywide rising from 1,049 on Friday to 1,075 yesterday, hospital admissions averaged 1,030 per day for the entire week.

Six deaths were announced by the Health ministry yesterday, one in the last 24 hours and five from facility audits. That pushed the country’s Covid-19 death toll to 3,049.

There were 58 recoveries and the number of those vaccinated against Covid-19 by yesterday stood at 952,967 — an increase by 1,941 from the 951,026 reported on Friday.

Quarantine hotel

Meanwhile, a directive by Saudi Arabia that travellers need to show proof of booking a quarantine hotel before heading there rubbed dozens of travellers the wrong way at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport yesterday.

A group of travellers of various nationalities, numbering about 150, were agitated when they were told they could not leave JKIA aboard the Saudia airline if they could not produce proof of booking a hotel.

“Kenya Airways coordinates Saudia flights, and so it was the one vetting passengers. Those who were barred from travel started shouting and caused a fracas, forcing police to intervene,” said an official at the airport, who cannot be named because he is not authorised to talk to the media.

By 5pm yesterday, the passengers, who had to be forcefully removed from the departures desk, were still at the airport as officials sought ways of assisting them.

“This order has been in place for about a week and it has caught some people off-guard,” the official said.

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