\u201cWe are already ruined. What more harm can coronavirus do?\u201d Irene Kampira asked as she sorted secondhand clothes at a bustling market in a poor suburb of Zimbabwe\u2019s capital, Harare.<\/p>\n
People in one of the world\u2019s most devastated nations are choosing daily survival over measures to protect themselves from a virus that \u201cmight not even kill us,\u201d Kampira said.<\/p>\n
Even as the country enters a \u201ctotal lockdown\u201d over the virus on Monday, social distancing is pushed aside in the struggle to obtain food, cash, cheap public transport, even clean water. The World Health Organization\u2019s recommended virus precautions seem far-fetched for many of Zimbabwe\u2019s 15 million people.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s better to get coronavirus while looking for money than to sit at home and die from hunger,\u201d Kampira said, to loud approval from other vendors.<\/p>\n
The southern African nation has few cases but its health system is in tatters, and the virus could quickly overwhelm it. Hundreds of public hospital doctors and nurses have gone on strike over the lack of protective equipment. Many Zimbabweans are already vulnerable from hunger or underlying health issues like HIV, which is present in 12% of the population.<\/p>\n
Last year a United Nations expert called the number of hungry people in Zimbabwe \u201cshocking\u201d for a country not in conflict. The World Food Program has said more than 7 million people, or half the country, needs aid.<\/p>\n
Harare, like most cities and towns across Zimbabwe, has an acute water shortage and residents at times go for months, even years, without a working tap. Many must crowd communal wells, fearing the close contact will speed the coronavirus\u2019 spread.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the taps were working we wouldn\u2019t be here, swarming the well like bees on a beehive or flies on sewage. We are busy exchanging coronavirus here coughing and spitting saliva at each other,\u201d said 18-year old Annastancia Jack while waiting her turn.<\/p>\n
The government has closed borders and banned gatherings of more than 50 people while encouraging people to stay at home.<\/p>\n
But the majority of Zimbabweans need to go out daily to put food on the table. With inflation over 500% most industries have closed, leaving many people to become street vendors. Zimbabwe has the world\u2019s second-largest informal economy after Bolivia, according to the International Monetary Fund.<\/p>\n
Police in recent days have tried to clear vendors from the streets, in vain. As in other African countries where many people rely on informal markets, a lockdown could mean immediate food shortages.<\/p>\n
Once-prosperous Zimbabwe was full of renewed promise with the forced resignation in late 2017 of longtime leader Robert Mugabe. But President Emmerson Mnangagwa has struggled to fulfil promises of prosperity since taking power. He blames the country\u2019s crisis in part on sanctions imposed on certain individuals, including himself, by the U.S. over rights abuses.<\/p>\n
Daily necessities in Zimbabwe make social distancing an elusive ideal. In downtown Harare, hordes of people congregate at banks for cash, which is in short supply. Others pack public transport.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are the only ones practicing social distancing, we sit in our cars all day,\u201d said Blessing Hwiribisha, a motorist in a fuel line snaking for more than a kilometer in the poor suburb of Kuwadzana.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook at them,\u201d he said. He pointed at a supermarket across the road where hundreds of people shoved to buy maize meal, which has become scarce due to a devastating drought and lack of foreign currency to import more.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat is happening in Zimbabwe is very scary. It\u2019s like we are playing cards. Its either you win coronavirus or you win starvation,\u201d said Tinashe Moyo at the supermarket. \u201cI am very scared.\u201d<\/p>\n
Few health workers are available as doctors and nurses strike.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a difference between being heroic and being suicidal,\u201d said Tawanda Zvakada, president of the Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association.<\/p>\n
Health workers described a lack of disinfectants, sanitizers and even water at hospitals.<\/p>\n
And yet Health Minister Obadiah Moyo repeatedly says Zimbabwe is \u201cwell prepared\u201d to deal with COVID-19 cases.<\/p>\n
But frightened health workers cited the death of a prominent broadcaster at an ill-equipped isolation center specifically reserved for COVID-19 cases.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey didn\u2019t have a ventilator to help him,\u201d Zvakada said. \u201cThe inability of our system to manage one patient is worrying. What about when there are 50 patients?\u201d<\/p>\n
Zimbabwe has has less than 20 ventilators to help people in severe respiratory distress, he said. He said the country needs hundreds to adequately deal with the virus.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe see a situation where Zimbabwe can become a graveyard if we are not careful,\u201d said Itai Rusike, director of the Harare-based Community Working Group on Health.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cWe are already ruined. What more harm can coronavirus do?\u201d Irene Kampira asked as she sorted secondhand clothes at a bustling market in a poor suburb of Zimbabwe\u2019s capital, Harare. People in one of the world\u2019s most devastated nations are choosing daily survival over measures to protect themselves from a virus that \u201cmight not even […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":13720,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,12],"tags":[1279,1236],"class_list":{"0":"post-21410","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-all-news","8":"category-policy","9":"tag-coronavirus-in-zimbabwe","10":"tag-obadiah-moyo"},"yoast_head":"\n