Morocco enters stage 2 of coronavirus pandemic

CASABLANCA – Morocco entered stage 2 of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, announced Monday Mohamed el Youbi, director of epidemiology and disease control as The North African country is grappling to boost its medical equipment in its fight against the outbreak.

Morocco’s health ministry reported Tuesday as of 1 pm it had 574 confirmed infections with 33 deaths and 15 cured patients.

The government used 2 billion dirhams ($200 million) from the special fund dedicated to the fight against the pandemic  to buy 1,000 resuscitation beds, 550 respirators, 100,000 sampling kits, 100,000 test kits and radiology and imaging equipment, according to a statement issued by the ministry of economy and finance.

The money will also be used for the purchase of medicines and will strengthen the operating resources of the health ministry, namely allowances for medical staff, disinfection and cleaning and fuel, said the ministry.

During a televised interview March 15, Moroccan Prime Minister Saadeddine El Otmani left doubts about Morocco’s hospital capacity to deal with coronavirus infections.

The next day Otmani took to Twitter to clarify the misunderstanding that has shaken the opinion on social media about Morocco’s ability to fight the pandemic while the country had only 28 confirmed cases.

“To clarify the misunderstood information, there are 250 resuscitation beds for potential patients with the coronavirus, and they can be increased as needed, otherwise Morocco has more than 1,600 resuscitation beds on the national territory,” tweeted the PM.

Since then the number of infections has dramatically increased despite the stringent measure that have been taken by the authorities since Moroccan started a lockdown March 20 with most businesses closed and people not allowed to leave their apartments except for food shopping, buying medicines and taking out trash.

Some outbreak experts said there could be a lot more cases in Morocco since there are only two laboratories – in Casablanca and Rabat - that test patients’ samples, which are time consuming, taking into account the long distances between several infected regions and the test centres.

They called on the health ministry to carry out wider testing in a bid to prevent the spread of the disease.

Youbi said that 85% of the deceased cases fell into the category of those who reached the advanced stage of the disease at the start of being taken in charge by the health authorities.

The health ministry announced Monday that those who think they have mild COVID19 symptoms can be diagnosed in over 60 hospitals across the country’s 12 regions.

Morocco was one the first countries in the world to implement stricter measures to fight the pandemic by shutting down its airspace, closing its border with the two Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla and imposing a curfew from 6 pm to 6 am.