Health authorities in South Sudan’s Lakes state say, at least twelve of their health workers in Yirol Hospital tested positive for coronavirus this week.

Dr. Marial Chewir Koch, a medical director at Yirol Hospital told Radio Tamazuj on Tuesday that the health workers came into contact with their colleague from Abang Primary Health Care (PHC) in Yirol West County last Friday. After contact tracing, 42 samples were taken for testing.

“Until now, we can confirm 12 positive cases in Yirol Hospital because the first case had some contacts. Until yesterday, we tested 42 samples out of 50 contacts, and from 42 samples, we found 12 positive and we are still waiting for other pending results from 8 samples,” he said.

According to Dr. Chewir, those infected include nine medical personnel and three support staff.

“All of those 12 positive cases are health workers including supporting staff, there is no outsider from them. Three are ambulance drivers working in the hospital with the CUAMM organization in support of the ministry of health. When the medical staff got infected by the disease, then the drivers who carry some of the medical staff became victims,” he explained.

He noted that those infected, all aged 30 years and above, have mild symptoms and have been asked to self-quarantine at home and avoid contact with family members until they are transferred to an isolation facility inside Yirol Hospital within 48 hours.

“The hospital is ready with some ventilators and if there are serious cases, we are ready to deal with any situation because our electricity is working 24 hours,” he assured.

Yirol Hospital received its testing machine last November but recorded no cases.

“Yes, in November last year, we have installed of Gene X-pert Machine to test COVID-19 and after the installation, our situation has improved in terms of testing of Coronavirus cases because we used to send our sample to Juba, we have tested 27 cases and all were negative,” the health official said.

"When some of our staff went for Christmas into various countries, especially the foreigners who are working with us and when they returned, definitely we recorded those cases. We cannot exactly say who has the case but possibly after they return staff, we managed to register those cases,” he added.

For his part, the secretary-general for the defunct Eastern lakes State Barnaba Mayor Deng urges the general public to adhere to the ministry of health safety measures against the virus which include wearing face masks and washing hands regularly with soap.

Marial Chewir, who is the medical director in Yirol hospital appeals to the international health partners and the UN Mission in South Sudan working in Lakes State to urgently complete the renovation of the isolation facility to accommodate the uprising cases of COVID-19 in Yirol Hospital.

"We also urged our people that we are now in a crisis of Coronavirus. We want everyone to wear face masks, Wash hands regularly with soaps and make social distancing measures when sitting in crowded places,” Chewir said. “COVID-19 is real.”

Last year, over 80 health workers tested positive for coronavirus since South Sudan recorded its first case in April.

To date, South Sudan has reported more than 3,913 confirmed cases, and 64 deaths, while 3,596 people have recovered.