Covid-19: Kenya cases rise to 316,700, death toll at over 5,000

Coronavirus cases in Kenya have continued to rise after 1,035 more people tested positive for the disease, from a sample size of 9,337 tested in the last 24 hours.

The positivity rate is now at 11.1 per cent, a drop from 11.7 percent on Thursday.

Of the new cases, 859 are Kenyans while 176 are foreigners. In terms of gender, 566 were male while 469 were female. The youngest is a three-month-old child while the oldest is 110 years.

The total confirmed positive cases are now 316,700 and cumulative tests so far conducted are 3,136,817.

Nairobi County, the capital city, leads in the number of new infections with 369 cases, while Nakuru County has 89, Mombasa 82, Nyamira 47, Bungoma 42 and Baringo 36. Other counties had below 29 cases with Isiolo, Samburu and Taita Taveta recording the lowest number of new cases with one each.

In a statement to media houses on Friday, Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe announced that 1,155 patients had recovered from the disease, 1,042 from the Home-Based Isolation and Care programme, while 113 are from various health facilities countrywide.

Total recoveries now stand at 280,199 of which 229,328 are from the Home-Based Care and Isolation programme, while 50,871 are from various health facilities countrywide.

Ten deaths were reported, one of them in the last 24 hours while the other 9 are late deaths reported after conducting facility record audits in the month of January 2022. Total fatalities in the country now stands at 5,482.

Also 1,119 patients are currently admitted to various health facilities countrywide, while 14,791 are under the Home-Based Isolation and Care programme.

According to Mr Kagwe, 48 patients are in the Intensive Care Unit, 44 of them on ventilatory support while four are on supplemental oxygen.

257 patients are on supplemental oxygen in general wards together and 252 others admitted in the hospitals. Five patients are in the High Dependency Unit.

Mr Kagwe said that 10,974,305 vaccines had been administered across the country as of Thursday. Of these, 6,164,507 are partially vaccinated while those fully vaccinated are 4,704,029.

Another 25,754 are doses administered to those between 15 to 18 years while 80,607 are booster doses.

The uptake of the second dose among those who received their first dose was at 57.8 percent while the proportion of adults fully vaccinated was 17.3 percent.

This article originally came from The East African