COVID-19: Ghana records 271 fresh cases a week after lifting lockdown

Ghana has recorded 271 new cases of coronavirus (COVID-19), a week after lifting the lockdown in its major cities, Accra and Kumasi.

The new cases brings the total number of cases recorded in the country to 1,550, GhanaWeb writes.

The news medium quoted the Ghana Health Service (GHS) as saying that while a total number of 11 people have died from the disease, 155 have recovered.

It noted that 62 percent of infected persons are male while 38 percent are female, which is consistent with the global trend of more males getting infected and dying from the virus. It said 84 percent of the cases have no travel history.

Ghana President Nana Akufo-Addo last week lifted the lockdown imposed in urban centres on the basis of “improved coronavirus testing.”

“In view of our ability to undertake aggressive contact of infected persons, the enhancement of our capacity to test, the expansion in the numbers of our treatment and isolation centres, our better understanding of the dynamism of the virus, the ramping up our domestic capacity to produce our own personal protective equipment, sanitisers and medicines, the modest successes chalked at containing the spread of the virus in Accra and Kumasi, and the severe impact of the poor and vulnerable, I have taken the decision to life the three-week-old restriction on movements in the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area and Kasoa, and the Greater Kumasi Metropolitan Area and the contiguous districts, with effect from 1am on Monday, 20th April,” he had said.

Ghana became the first country to lift the restriction on movement in the West African region.