19th March 2020

I still have plenty of work to do at home and it looks like this will increase.  The two new VSO volunteers who only arrived a week or so ago decide to leave and go home.  One is from Ireland and the other from Australia.  

In the afternoon I walk to the local shop, the more wealthy are pulling up in their cars, and shop assistants are coming out and taking their orders and collecting their shopping.  It seems they are not so willing to take the risk of going into the shop.  

My friends who work in the UK tell me that the school is closing to most students next week, but will open to vulnerable and key workers children and that all staff have been asked to come in. It seems strange that schools here have been closed for nearly a week now, ever since the first C-19 case, while schools in UK and US have been operating on full schedule.

There are no new cases of C-19 in Rwanda today, and the Ministry of Defence reveal that all confirmed patients remain under treatment in a stable condition, isolated from other patients. They are also tracing all the contacts of those infected and testing and isolating them. There is a 14 day mandatory quarantine for any airline passenger flying in with symptoms, as well as a self quarantine period of 14 days for all others. with a warning that these requirements will be strictly enforced.  Those in self quarantine have to call the Ministry of Health daily to report on their condition.

The coronovirus death toll in Italy overtakes China’s, after rising by 427 to 3,405. Rwanda still has 11 cases.