Coronavirus is currently the subject of a number of rumors.  About the source, the coronavirus could be manmade; others say that it originates from contact human- animals like pangolin and bats or that the virus is just another type of influenza, and doesn’t kill black people.

All of them are not true. What is known so far, in December 2019, an outbreak of coronavirus infection occurred in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China and spread across China and has currently spread to dozens of countries, including Rwanda.

This virus cause the disease named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19); thus, World Health Organisation (WHO) refers to the virus as COVID-19 virus in its current documentation.

The rumour of manmade virus is one related to forensic epidemiology as criminal, but the fact is not true also.  Scientists across the world are unanimous that the pandemic virus is not related to the investigation of bioterrorism acts. 

No country in the world is spared from this scourge.

COVID-19 situation continues to evolve, the world remains on high alert, responding quickly as developments occur, via the updates of World Health Organisation, and at each country level. France has declared being in the situation of war against the virus with a high number of soldiers deployed in the streets.

Now, Covid-19 pandemic has fully arrived in Rwanda (8 cases on 18 March 2020) according to the updtes of Ministry of Health.  How bad it will be, it is a mostly function of how the population will respond at every level.

Measures have been put in place to help to prevent the spread of the virus and protect the health of citizens while ensuring business continuity. Such measures include limiting all non-essential travel, working from home where possible, closing churches and schools, and reminding everyone on regularly basis about good hygiene practices. Hydroalcholic gel at the glance for washing hands.

It is clear that, the world with high technology capability, will still face the challenges of

Pandemics, climate change, earthquakes and massive natural catastrophes in the future. We have two options: To build the power to mitigate those challenges through our preparation and resilience, or to make them worse through our failures. 

Therefore, we are not entitled to failures. God bless Rwanda.

The writer works with Rwanda Forensic Laboratory (RFL)