Although many people had completed their institutional quarantine towards the end of the week, the government said several people will have to undergo another 14-days after mixing with people who later tested positive to coronavirus disease COVID-19.
Cross-sections of People held under quarantine in different parts of Kampala and Entebbe have declared a hunger strike after the Health Ministry of health extended their stay for another 14 days.
Although many people had completed their institutional quarantine towards the end of the week, the government said several people will have to undergo another 14-days after mixing with people who later tested positive to coronavirus disease COVID-19.
Following this, some of the people under quarantine say that even on the last day they tested negative, but they are being held at the facility, and not cleared to go home despite not having come in contact with the cases.
Dr Jimmy Spire Ssentongo, a lecturer at Uganda Martyrs University, writer and cartoonist says that although tested negative to COVID-19, and has always been locked up in his room for the past 14-days, the government has decided to keep them in the quarantine centre.
Ssentongo who came back to Uganda on March 18, is bothered that several people, who returned with him on the same flight were never quarantined, while others were given special consideration to be quarantine within their homes, yet those who endured the institutional quarantine are still being held.
Spire, who was quarantined at Arch Apartments in Ntinda with 15 other people, says all of them stayed in self-contained rooms where they had no contact with anyone. Today, Spire posted a protest note on social media saying that their only crime is the fact that someone in the same quarantine centre who has also been in his own room tested positive.
Spire has declared a protest, saying he needs no one to knock on his door except if they have news for when he is getting his quarantine certificate. He says he does not need food but only needs to get out of there.
Reacheal Namutebi, who is also held up in Arch apartments says that their fear is that they will be held the longer than expected, adding that although a case was discovered a week ago, the new policy on quarantine has been abruptly enforced without due consideration of their plight.
“I am stressed, I have a headache because of this and we are all worried. The problem is that some cases might come as a result of the bad quarantine system,” she says.
Another person quarantined at Entebbe Central Inn said she was starting a hunger strike in protest of her continued detention. At the Entebbe Central Inn, there are 45 people under quarantine.
The Uganda Virus Research Institute Director Dr Pontiano Kareebu says that scientifically if the people under quarantine did not mix and were locked up in their rooms, they should be cleared to go.
He says that they had a meeting during the week where it was said that when someone tests positive in a hotel, the people there should have their stay extended. He, however, referred the matter to Dr Henry Kyobe, the COVID-19 incident commander.
Alex Otto & Christopher Kisekka
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