COVID-19 recovered patient decries hostility, stigma

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Engineer Charles Banya Lwanga, one of the patients who have just recovered from coronavirus disease-COVID-19 has decried the hostility and stigma against travelers who entered Uganda during the month of March.

The Ministry of Health has overtime stated that it is tracing over 18,800 people who arrived in Uganda between March 7 and March 20, a few days before Uganda registered its first COVID-19 case. Many of these had gone through Dubai, one of the busiest transit hubs which has been devastated by the novel coronavirus.

But Banya, 49, says the declaration was a trigger for media instigated hostility against him and many of the people in this cohort. He says prior to his admission at Entebbe Regional Referral Hospital, local leaders and residents from his community singled him out creating an impression that he was hiding from health authorities.

Banya says that after returning from a business trip in Canada, he willingly went for tests. On hindsight, he thinks he could have been infected while travelling between Canada and Washington DC or the long-haul flight from DC to Addis Ababa.

Banya says that upon arrival, he was screened at Entebbe International Airport and told that he was fine, after which he proceeded to his home in Kalangala district. But he went for two additional tests as a result of community pressure. It was after the second test that he learnt that he had the virus and as such advised go to Masaka Hospital for treatment.

He was picked by an ambulance after crossing with a ferry from Kalangala to Masaka via Bukakata port. But the hospital was closed by the time they arrived and the ambulance thereafter dropped him at Entebbe hospital where he was confined in a room for about 21 days albeit with no significant signs and symptoms of COVID-19.

During the first five days, Banya says he slept most of the time due to general body weakness. Then he started doing exercises in his room until he was told he had recovered from the virus after his second negative test on Sunday.

He explains that apart from challenges of providing regular meals in the first days, Entebbe hospital is a great facility. Apart from the health workers and support teams that helped him cope with the disease, he also received external support mainly financial and spiritual from friends and family during the time he battled the disease.

Banya is however positive that his community is more receptive now due to mass sensitization and also because his contacts have all tested negative.

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