Associated Press
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) Tanzania’s president says God has eliminated COVID-19 in his country. His own church now begs to differ.
From the local Catholic authority warning this week of a new wave of coronavirus infections, to government institutions now requiring staffers to take precautions, populist President John Magufuli is being openly questioned as the African continent fights a strong resurgence in cases and deaths.
“We are not an island,” the Catholic secretariat of the Tanzania Episcopal Conference said in a widely shared statement this week. It urged followers, which include the president, to pray but also to adopt measures long practiced in the rest of the world, including avoiding public gatherings and close personal contact. The church’s newspaper on Friday stressed in a large front-page headline: “There is corona.”
Dubai is being blamed by several countries for spreading the coronavirus abroad after the city opened itself to New Year’s revelers.
But pandemic concerns have returned to the spotlight in Tanzania as the world focuses on the arrival of COVID-19 vaccines.
While other African countries seek millions of doses, Magufuli this week accused people who had been vaccinated overseas of bringing the virus back into Tanzania. He also questioned whether the vaccines work.
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“If the white man was able to come up with vaccinations, then vaccinations for AIDS would have been brought, tuberculosis would be a thing of the past, vaccines for malaria and cancer would have been found,“ he said on Wednesday.
Tanzanian President Magufuli
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) Tanzania’s president says God has eliminated COVID-19 in his country. His own church now begs to differ.
From the local Catholic authority warning this week of a new wave of coronavirus infections, to government institutions now requiring staffers to take precautions, populist President John Magufuli is being openly questioned as the African continent fights a strong resurgence in cases and deaths.
“We are not an island,” the Catholic secretariat of the Tanzania Episcopal Conference said in a widely shared statement this week. It urged followers, which include the president, to pray but also to adopt measures long practiced in the rest of the world, including avoiding public gatherings and close personal contact. The church’s newspaper on Friday stressed in a large front-page headline: “There is corona.”
Tanzania's leader denies COVID; now Church pushes back cruxnow.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from cruxnow.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Nairobi, Kenya
Tanzaniaâs president says God has eliminated COVID-19 in his country. His own church now begs to differ.
From the local Catholic authority warning this week of a new wave of coronavirus infections, to government institutions now requiring staffers to take precautions, populist President John Magufuli is being openly questioned as the African continent fights a strong resurgence in cases and deaths.
âWe are not an island,â the Catholic secretariat of the Tanzania Episcopal Conference said in a widely shared statement this week. It urged followers, which include the president, to pray but also to adopt measures long practiced in the rest of the world, including avoiding public gatherings and close personal contact. The churchâs newspaper on Friday stressed in a large front-page headline: âThere is corona.â