Lockdown will not guarantee the disappearance of COVID-19 - Buabeng Asamoah

NPP Communications Director, Yaw Buaben Asamoa says the calls for a lockdown due to the increasing numbers of the coronavirus cases is not a guarantee that the virus will disappear from Ghana.

He said, for the virus to be controlled, individuals must exhibit self-disciplined by adhering to the strict protocols imposed by President Akufo-Addo and those prescribed by health professionals.

This he says will curb the spread of coronavirus rather than calling for a lockdown. He adds that the relatively high coronavirus cases being recorded in recent times are due to routine and enhanced surveillance adopted by the government to ensure that the spread of the virus is controlled, adding that country would have recorded figures around 1000 if they had not adopted these measures.

Speaking in an interview with Ghanaweb, Yaw Buaben said it is better to encourage Ghanaians to adhere to the precautionary measures rather than calling for a lockdown as the motives of the lockdown become insignificant if the protocols are not adhered to.

He said “lockdown does not deliver magic and lockdown by itself will not guarantee the disappearance of COVID-19. Our high numbers are because we are ahead of care, in other words, we are actively tracing people who have come into contact with infected people, test them and isolate them when the results come out positive and that strategy protects the larger population and also protects the individuals who are involved. So, if the numbers are going up it is because we are testing so rapidly but we need self-discipline even in lockdown. If we are not careful the numbers will keep spreading because individuals will spread it to us.”

“I encourage Ghanaians to observe the protocols and the protocols that will help us require self-discipline to beat the virus. People are talking about the enforcement, the enforcement, the government cannot arrest all of us because we are not wearing masks and not observing social distancing but if we are self-disciplined, we would beat the virus faster. We have to stop the spread through self-discipline. We have the stay at home protocol, observe it.” he added

Meanwhile, Ghana has recorded 427 new Coronavirus cases, increasing the country's coronavirus case count to 5,127.

This was announced by the Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr. Patrick Aboagye at a media briefing on Tuesday, May 12, 2020. The Greater Accra region has recorded 89 new cases whilst the Ashanti region has 307 new cases.

The Central region has also recorded 27 new cases with the Western and Volta regions recording 3 and 1 new cases respectively. According to Dr. Aboagye, the majority of the new cases were recorded from workplaces.

Of the 5,127 cases, 1474 were recorded from routine surveillance, 115 are travellers who were put into mandatory quarantine upon arrival and the remaining 3,538 were identified from enhanced surveillance.

Recoveries and deaths, however, still stand at 494 and 22 respectively bringing the active cases to 4611.