The World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have named Malawi as a COVID-19 high risk country following a spike of cases in the country’s third wave of the pandemic.
People have been warned against traveling to the country.
“Malawi is facing an unprecedented rise in COVID-19 cases in its third wave of the coronavirus pandemic”, reads a report by Voice of America (VOA).
Malawi’s Ministry of Health reported that that the country had registered 512 new COVID-19 cases and eight new deaths.
“Of the new cases, 510 are locally transmitted cases”, reads a statement issued by the Presidential Taskforce on the pandemic.
Blantyre, the country’s commercial city located in the Southern Region, is the current hotspot, recording 158 cases in the past 24 hours.
The Ministry of Health reported that the country recorded an infection rate of about 25%, which is up from about 2 percent in May.
Malawi has only conducted 283,536 tests since April 2020 when the first Covid-19 case was confirmed in the country.
Meanwhile, the country announced that it has run out of the is Covid-19 vaccine stock.
“The COVID-19 vaccination remain paused hence no doses were administered over the past 24 hours. A total of 428,407 vaccine doses has been administered in the country so far”, said Health Minister Khumbize Kandodo Chiponda.
The country has only administered 385,242 first doses and 43,165 second doses.
In its travel notice published this week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has advised people to avoid traveling to Malawi, saying in the current situation in Malawi, even fully vaccinated travelers may be at risk of getting and spreading COVID-19 variants.
“Avoid travel to Malawi. If you must travel to Malawi, make sure you are fully vaccinated before travel. Because of the current situation in Malawi, even fully vaccinated travelers may be at risk for getting and spreading COVID-19 variants”, reads CDC’s Risk Assessment Level for COVID-19 on Malawi.
Similarly, the World Health Organization (WHO) has added Malawi to a list of African countries that expose people to a high risk of COVID-19 infection.
Malawi remains on the red list of countries for the UK and, like the US, has advised people against travelling to any of the red list countries.
