Tanzania’s President John Magufuli appears to Acknowledge COVID-19 problem

Tanzania’s President John Magufuli appears to be acknowledging the problem of COVID-19 in the country, after months of claiming the virus had been defeated through prayer and steam treatments. While not specifically naming the virus, Magufuli on Sunday urged Tanzanians to begin wearing face masks for “respiratory” illnesses that are becoming a problem.

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It is almost a year since Magufuli declared his country to be free from COVID-19 and said prayer helped to defeat the virus.

But after a Sunday church mass in the capital, Dodoma, Magufuli urged citizens to take precautions including traditional remedies and wear face masks — but only locally made ones.

At the end of last week, Magufuli called on citizens for three days of prayer to defeat unnamed respiratory diseases amid warnings from the Catholic church, the U.S. embassy and others that Tanzania is seeing a deadly resurgence in coronavirus infections.

Story compiled by VOA

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