JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Africa’s reported COVID-19 death toll surpassed 100,000 on Friday, a fraction of those reported on other continents but rising fast as a second wave of infections overwhelms hospitals.
FILE PHOTO: A funeral worker walks carrying a casket lowering device after a burial at the Westpark Cemetery, amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Johannesburg, South Africa, December 24, 2020. REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko/File Photo
The continent’s reported deaths, at 100,354, compare favourably with North America, which has registered more than half a million, and Europe, which is approaching 900,000, a Reuters tally shows.
But deaths are rising sharply across Africa, driven by its southern region, especially economic powerhouse South Africa, which accounts for nearly half. South Africa was ravaged by a second wave caused by a more contagious variant that has jammed up casualty wards.
“The increased number (of infections) has led to many severe cases and some of the countries really found it quite difficult to cope,” Richard Mihigo, coordinator of the immunisation programme at the World Health Organization’s Africa office, told Reuters.
“We have seen some countries getting to their limit in terms of oxygen supply, which has got a really negative impact in terms of case management for severe cases.”
Mihigo said the rise in deaths was pronounced in countries near South Africa like Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Malawi, raising the possibility that the 501Y.V2 variant identified in South Africa late last year had spread through the southern Africa region - although more genomic sequencing needs to be carried out to prove that.
International aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF) this month called for urgent vaccine distributions in southern Africa to counter the spread of the new variant, as most African countries have lagged richer Western nations in launching mass vaccination programmes.
Reuters data show Africa’s case fatality rate is now at around 2.6%, higher than the global average of 2.3%, and marginally up on the 2.4% rate after the first wave of infections - which at the time compared favourably with other continents.
Experts caution against reading too much into the data - the real toll may be much higher or lower. For instance, South Africa’s excess deaths - deaths considered over-and-above the normal rate - during the pandemic have reached over 137,000, almost three times its official COVID-19 death toll.
Then again, in some cases Africa’s low testing rates could inflate its true case fatality rate (CFR), said Professor Francisca Mutapi, an infectious disease expert at the University of Edinburgh.
“If deaths being registered as COVID-19 deaths are not necessarily contingent on a positive test ... as is the case in South Africa, then this can drive up CFR,” she said.
Even with these caveats acknowledged, African countries look like they are struggling with COVID-19 more than last year.
“Are we counting all the deaths on the continent? No ... but most people on the continent do know somebody who has died of COVID during this second wave,” Africa CDC director John Nkengasong told reporters last week.
“Hospitals are being overwhelmed due to health systems that are fragile.”
O  chegou hoje a 100.015 mortes por , ultrapassando a barreira dos 100 mil óbitos por  e, com este número, segundo o Worldometer, está atrás apenas da Oceania, que tem pouco mais cerca de 1.080 fatalidades.

Os três países africanos com mais mortes são, respectivamente, África do Sul (48.478), Egito (10.150) e Marrocos (8.524).
 
A -África já havia anunciado no passado dia 11 que o continente chegaria a 100 mil mortos pela doença nos próximos dias, enfatizando que 22.300 mortes haviam sido reportadas apenas nos 28 dias anteriores. 

'''Caso de sucesso ou de subnotificações?'''

Apesar da recente preocupação da OMS-África, as poucas mortes no continente poderiam se um caso de sucesso, não fosse um pequeno detalhe: as subnotificações, situação que já preocupava as autoridades de saúde mundiais em março de 2020, quando a pandemia começou a piorar no mundo todo, mas que não mereceu qualquer menção da , OMS-África e da União Africana nos últimos meses. 

O caso da Tanzânia ilustra bem a “maquiagem” nos dados da pandemia na África. Neste país, especificamente, o governo decretou a extinção da doença em abril do ano passado, creditando o sucesso a Deus, e desde então nenhum dado sobre a covid-19 no país foi divulgado. Dias atrás, não satisfeito, o presidente John Magufuli atacou as vacinas covid-19. Num discurso na TV ele disse: "Temos que ser muito prudentes com estas vacinas importadas. Se esta gente foi capaz de descobrir vacinas contra o coronavírus, também deveria haver outras para a malária, o , a tuberculose e o HIV. Estas vacinas são perigosas para a nossa saúde e o Ministério da Saúde não deveria se precipitar”.

Outro fato que prova que o continente pode estar muito longe de ser um caso de sucesso é o apelo crescente da OMS para que os países mais pobres tenham acesso a vacinas covid-19 de modo equitativo. Tedros Adhanom, diretor-geral da Organização, chegou a pedir que os países ricos dividissem as vacinas compradas com os mais pobres. 

A baixa testagem ainda foi apontada hoje à Reuters pela Professora Francisca Mutapi  como um dos problemas para a apresentação de números mais confiáveis pelos países africanos.