Multinational - COVID-19 Pandemic Crisis: Emergency Assistance to Support COVID-19 Response in African Countries

The Emergency Assistance to Support COVID-19 Response in African Countries is designed to support Regional Member Countries (RMCs) to contain the spread of the virus and mitigate its impacts. The envisaged interventions complement the efforts of other partners including WHO and the African Union to support the response to, and mitigate the impact of, the pandemic. Indeed, the African continent is witnessing late transmission of the virus which is unstable and rapidly changing. At 25 March 2020, the confirmed cases and deaths were 2,358 and 58 respectively in 44 countries. These forty-four (44) affected countries need urgent support. Furthermore, all African countries are at risk and must be ready to contain, manage and mitigate the impact of the virus. African countries are developing country COVID-19 multisectoral response strategies. So far, thirty-five (35) countries have fully developed strategies estimated at USD189 million. African countries need to urgently mobilize resources to implement these strategies. The present project will focus on building capacities and capabilities of RMCs to promptly detect and contain the spread of the COVID 19. The WHO will identify target countries and provide their details when submitting final reports. The main interventions are: (i) Capacity Building on infection prevention, testing and case management; (ii) Surveillance system; (iii) purchasing and distributing laboratory test kits and reagents; (iv) Purchasing and distributing personal protective equipment (PPE) (v) Supporting coordination mechanism at national and regional levels.