06 Dec 2020

Lobatse District Health Management Team (DHMT) family physician, Dr Bobby Kgosiemang has urged the community to abide by Covid-19 regulations.

Dr Kgosiemang said on December 2, when updating councillors about THE COVID-19 situation in Lobatse, that the town was continuing to experience an increase of local transmission. 

He said 84 new positive cases were recorded in the last week of November within the Lobatse DHMT area. “Seventy-nine of the cases were Batswana while five were truck drivers. The 79 cases were local transmissions,” Dr Kgosiemang said.

He said a total of 893 COVID-19 cases had been registered in Lobatse DHMT area between May and end of November. 

He said 604 of those cases were found in Batswana, while the rest were truck drivers, and majority of the local cases were local transmissions.

“The first case to a Motswana was in early August and 82 perc ent of the local cases had been due to local transmission. There has been 523 recoveries, while there are 81 active cases,” Dr Kgosiemang said. 

Dr Kgosiemang said schools in Lobatse had been severely affected, with positive cases found in pre, primary and secondary schools. 

He said Lobatse Senior Secondary School was the hardest hit as it  recorded a total of 92 cases between November 10 and end of the month. 

Dr Kgosiemang said most cases were Form Four pupils, 48 of whom  were boarding pupils.

“In short, there has been an outbreak of COVID-19 at Lobsec, and most of the affected are the Form Four students, while there were few Form Five cases,” the doctor said. 

He said after carrying out contact tracing and compliance measures, the DHMT observed that the virus was imported from households into the school by the pupils. He said the virus managed to spread because some boarding pupils were not strictly complying with wearing of face masks at the hostels. 

He said the DHMT had recommended postponement of this year’s exams by the Form Fours. Dr Kgosiemang said renovation works were ongoing to turn the old Teacher Training College (TTC) buildings into a COVID-19 isolation centre. He said the place would have 120 beds, which would significantly increase the isolation space in Lobatse. 

“We thank the Botswana Defence Force for offering us this facility because Lobatse DHMT has recorded a high number of positive coronavirus cases, which require isolation,” he said.

Peleng East Clinic has been the only isolation centre in Lobatse, while other patients were transferred to Gaborone and Pitsane for isolation. ends