Open AccessAfrica’s COVID-19 third wave: A coupled behavior-disease system in a mutual feedback loop
Author(s) -
Jia Bainga Kangbai,
Mahmoud Sheku,
Braima Koroma,
Joseph Mustapha Macathy,
Daniel Kaitibi,
Foday Sahr,
Angella Magdalene George,
Fatmata Gegbe,
Daphne Cummings-Wray,
Lawrence Sao Babawo
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
the gazette of medical sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2692-4374
DOI - 10.46766/thegms.epidemiol.21101704
Subject(s) - pandemic , covid-19 , third wave , geography , latin americans , development economics , political science , medicine , law , sociology , disease , political economy , economics , infectious disease (medical specialty) , pathology
A year after COVID-19 was declared a pandemic much of the Africa continent started experiencing spikes in the number of COVID-19 cases and related deaths in what was referred to as the third wave of the pandemic. These spikes came right behind the heels of a second wave of the pandemic that barely went unnoticed in Africa. As of July 2021, Morocco, South Africa, Tunisia, Egypt, Nigeria, Libya, Kenya, Algeria, Zambia and Ethiopia accounted for approximately 86% of the reported increase in COVID-19; these countries were aptly described as being at the forefront of the continent’s third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Unlike those countries in Asia and Latin America that experienced what may generally being described as autochthonous COVID-19 third wave, Africa’s third wave COVID-19 cases are widely believed to have been triggered by imported cases. Africa like the rest of the world relaxed its COVID-19 restrictions almost at the same time; hence the continent’s spikes of COVID-19 cases and related deaths during the third wave of the pandemic have raised some questions.