This archive report was first published on 26 June 2020.
On June 26, 2020, President Uhuru Kenyatta emphasized that the decision to reopen the country's economy would be informed by the level of preparedness by devolved units to respond to Covid-19 infections.
Speaking during a virtual meeting of the national and county governments coordinating summit, the President stated that the decision would largely be determined by the counties' capacity to effectively respond to new cases of Covid-19 imported into their territories.
“County readiness to respond to new imported cases of infection will largely determine our national readiness to re-open the country as a whole,” he said. The President noted that the nation is the sum total of all the 47 counties, and if the counties have met the necessary thresholds, then the nation will be ready to re-open.
During the meeting, a progress report on the roll-out of the minimum Covid-19 response measures required ahead of the re-opening of the economy was presented by Kakamega Governor Wycliffe Oparanya, who is also the current Chairperson of the Council of Governors.
According to Governor Oparanya, counties had attained a total of 6,898 isolation beds against the national target of 30,500 units. He also reported that 12 counties had met the 300 per county isolation beds threshold while 34 devolved units were on course to meet the target within the month.
Health CS Mutahi Kagwe cautioned against the re-opening of the economy before the response preparedness threshold agreed upon is fully met, citing countries that had rushed to re-open their economies without having proper COVID-19 containment protocols in place and were experiencing an upsurge in new infections.
