Coronavirus: We’re using funds from our research work – Kumasi testing centre

A senior lecturer at the Department of Theoretical and Applied Biology at the Kwame Nkrumah Universities of Science and Technology and a Research Scientists at the Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research (KCCR) in Tropical Medicine, Dr Agustina Angelina Sylvrlerken they are testing covid-19 cases with resources from the research work.

“For now we able to use resources from our research work to test the samples but once the numbers go up we will need some support from the government. We have also received support from our collaborators from Germany, we work closely with them and they actually develop the test the World Health Organisation is using, but like I said ones the numbers go up, we definitely need some support from the government,” she told Ultimate FM’s Isaac Bediako Justice.

According to her, the KCCR received 31 samples of suspected cases of Covid-19 and three have tested positive and are currently in isolation centres receiving treatment.

She said, currently, the centre has what it takes in terms of resources to test but in a situation where the numbers will go up, “we will need more support to enable us do our testing.”

According to her, those three who have tested positive are in isolation and the clinicians are attending to them because ones you tested positive you need to be isolated and given the needed care.

On the issue of fear and anxiety, Dr Angelina said “we don’t need to be panic, afraid or scared because if we adhere to the advised the President gave us as well as others from the experts on the need to practice handwashing with soap under running water, using sanitizers at least containing 60% of ethanol and practising cough and sneezing ethics for example sneezing on a smooth paper and dispose it immediately, don’t be in a crowded environment, no funerals, mosques, churches nor temples “we will minimise it.”

“As I keep on saying we don’t wants to be like Italy where the whole country has been shut down and I believe that if we pay attention to these instructions we will be able to contain the spread of Covid-19,” she said.