Medics rubbish Speaker’s coronavirus statement, terming it false hope

The Uganda Medical Association has released a press statement on the alleged coronavirus treatment that is to be made in Uganda by a US Professor as stated by Uganda’s Speaker of Parliament, Right Honourable Rebbecca Aritwala Kadaga.

According to the statement, the medics are alarmed by the stated treatment that has not even been subjected to Uganda’s rigorous testing for safety and efficacy as required by the National Drug Authority.

The medics say, “In Uganda, the only competent authority that can give permission for the entry and use of medicine is the National Drug Authority.”

Surprisingly, to the best of their knowledge, not any such testing, scrutiny or oversight of the medicine the speaker talked about has ever been undertaken by the National Drug Authority.

The statement was co-signed by Dr. Richard Idro, the President Uganda Medical Association; Dr. Muhereza Mukuzi, the General Secretary, Uganda Medical Association and  Dr. Misaki Wanyengera, Scientist and Senior Lecturer, Makerere University.

  Medics generally rubbished the Right Honourable Speaker’s statement. They said,” Among other things, the Speaker said, ‘A Professor who manufactured a treatment for Corona virus was in the US and was in Uganda last week and that he has donated the patent rights to Uganda and within a fortnight, the treatment will be made here. The Speaker reportedly said the company was known as Dei International.”

This wowed the medics. They explained that the SARS-COV-2 coronavirus ( the cause of CVID-19) is a new strain of coronaviruses which was discovered to cause human disease less than three months ago in Wuhan, China.

The medics asserted that as of today, there is no medicine that can cure the disease or vaccine that can prevent it, much as many are being tested. The medics said that Uganda’s Speaker of Parliament was giving false hope. The cautioned that it was dangerous because it stops people from taking up all other preventive messages.