Dagoretti South Member of Parliament, John Kiarie shared a statement on Saturday that laid bare what he termed as the ‘government sugarcoating’ of the situation of the Covid-19 outbreak in the country.
Taking to his Facebook account, the Jubilee legislator shared shocking information on how the government has allegedly failed to prepare adequately to handle the outbreak of the fast spreading virus in the country.
According to Kiarie aka KJ, 7,000 Kenyans who flew into the country in the last five days are in isolation centers at Lenana School and Kinyanjui Technical Institute in his contituency.
Kiare raised concerns over what he termed as an acute shortage of testing kits warning that the country cannot adequately test all those people who are at the isolation center foer the coronavirus.
“Kenya currently has an acute shortage of testing kits, so the country cannot adequately test how many of these new arrivals are currently positive! We currently do not know the exact number of positive cases in the country. Moderate estimates are that by May, Kenya will be reporting more than 10,000,” Kiare intimated in the post.
The MP challenged the president Uhuru Kenyatta government to stop sugar-coating the real situation of the deadly virus in the country and tell Kenyans the whole truth to enable them better prepare to face the pandemic.
“Kenya Government must forthwith communicate the gravity of the real situation without sugarcoating anymore. Let Kenyans know how bad things are about to get. They will be better equipped to make personal decisions and put up with government decrees, measures, and restrictions,” he said.
He added: “Kenya national government must set up massive Isolation Centres around the country; over 4,000-bed isolation centers in Kasarani, Nyayo and City Stadiums in Nairobi. Over 3,000-bed Isolation centers in Mombasa and similar centers countrywide. This cannot and must not be left to county governments. Again, even they don’t know yet just how hard this thing is about to hit Kenya.”
He further asked the government to start mass production of face masks and invest in more ventilators to enable it to better deal with those infected to tame further spread of the coronavirus.
“Kenya Government MUST take stock of available ventilators in the country and then immediately order, buy, beg or steal more from wherever they must!.Health Committee in Parliament will have to take leadership on the legislative response to this disaster. A Kenya Covid-19 Bill is long overdue. Kenya Parliament must step up to the plate. Sorry, populist pay cut stories won’t help here,” he further stated.
He asked the government to consider taking long terms measure in the fight against Covid-19.
“Kenya Government MUST stop thinking April and start strategizing May going forward! This is critical because short term thinking got us here in the first place! We have been missing critical Milestones and that is why we are where we are! This is an imported disease! If we just kept our borders closed in the first place we would not be in this mess! he wrote in the post that elicited varied reactions.
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