Morocco reports record number of COVID-19 cases

MANILA - Morocco's health ministry on Wednesday reported a record number of  coronavirus infections in the last 24 hours.

The ministry confirmed new 1,283 coronavirus cases and 18 additional deaths. Morocco now has 28,500 total cases with a death toll of 436 since the beginning of outbreak.

Strict lockdown across Morocco brought the economy to its knees in the first half. The government placed on July 25 eight major cities under lockdown in a bid to contain the spread of coronavirus amid a spike in COVID-19 cases in the past two weeks.

The ministry decided to treat asymptomatic patients at home who meet some of the very specific medical and health criteria and the conditions of isolation as an alternative to hospitalisation.

“The COVID-19 case management protocol only concerns asymptomatic cases that do not represent any clinical sign and people who respond to a number of conditions, such as the absence of risk factors such as advanced age, chronic diseases, pregnancy and breastfeeding, ” said Mourad Mrabet, the coordinator of the National Center for Public Health Emergency Operations at the health ministry.

Mrabet said that home care process applied to people who meet favourable conditions for isolation, including a well-ventilated single room and the absence of vulnerable people living under the same roof.

“This protocol emanates from a number of observations and data in the field which revealed that a large part of asymptomatic cases refuse to be treated in a hospital establishment, since they have no clinical signs and that they are doing well. For them, they are not sick and it is very difficult to convince them to be taken care of in the hospital,” he said.