Ministry of Health

As some countries begin to open up, returning to work, Google is rolling out Transit alerts to Maps to help people avoid crowds. The feature displays when public transportation is likely to be more or less busy. There is an additional alert for drivers to see updates on their route. Google helps passengers avoid busy times, and keep up social distancing amid the pandemic. To get started one just searches for a station in Google Maps to see the departure board and busyness data, where available. Unfortunately, this feature is not here in the 254.

June 6th 2020 finally arrived with Kenyans following the live televised broadcast on what President Kenyatta would announce on the way forward. So far, Kenya has 2,862 positive covid-19 cases with 85 deaths. The President alluded to the memes he saw trending that day of how Kenyans wanted him to open up the country, citing freedom, but he said he will not do it at the detriment of the country as much as he wanted to, for the sake of the economy. He posed a question on the country's health care institutions, were we ready to offer home care at the risk of exposing loved ones to the virus?

Dr.Rashid Aman, Chief Administrative Secretary from the Ministry of Health, on Tuesday 2nd June 2020, said “We have a backlog of samples that we need to test but we will clear them with time.” This is admittance that the delayed results is due to the temporary shortage of testing materials. The overall implication is scaling down of testing, that will hamper efforts to identify the infected in good time, to act fast and reduce infections.

Kenya celebrated Madaraka day celebrations 57 years for the first time indoors and virtually. President Uhuru Kenyatta gave his speech again for the first time from State house that was given live coverage as Kenyans followed from home. The president said that in the coming days he will address the nation on matters going forward amidst the increasing positive cases on covid-19.

Safaricom Foundation in partnership with Scope International has set up 17 sanitation booths at a cost of Kes 1.1 million in Homabay, Siaya, Migori, Kisii, Bungoma and Busia, to be used by 60,000 people daily including ferry users with the aim of curbing the spread of COVID-19. These booths are strategically located at Kenya's border to Tanzania at Isebania in Migori County and at the Ugandan border in Bungoma and Busia counties.

Thousands of health workers on Sunday agreed to suspend a strike notice that was to start Monday after reaching a deal with the government. The health workers’ leaders had held talks with the Ministry of Health officials on Friday and agreed to push forward the strike by 21 days to give room for discussion.

The Kenya Health Workers Union Society accuse the government and council of governors of neglecting their welfare saying health workers are overexposed and not protected from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Led by Kenya National Clinical Union Chairman Peterson Wachira, the workers said their push to get involved in the fight against the virus has fallen on deaf ears.

The medics said no training has been offered to the workers besides being subjected to poor working condition.