France boosts Uganda’s COVID-19 fight with more PPE, testing kits

Kampala, Uganda | RONALD MUSOKE | The French Government has donated to Uganda an assortment of personal protective equipment, testing kits and respirators to boost the country’s fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

The donation worth about €2.7 million (Shs 10.8bn) includes 1,000,000 FFP2 masks, 54,600 antigen testing kits and nine (09) Osiri3 respirators.

The donations were handed over on Tuesday to Robinah Nabbanja, the Prime Minister of Uganda and Dr. Jane-Ruth Aceng, the Minister of Health, at the National Medical Stores headquarters in Entebbe.

While speaking at the ceremony, Jules-Armand Aniambossou, the French Ambassador to Uganda said the donation was a “gesture of solidarity” towards a friendly country in the fight against a common enemy.

He re-affirmed the commitment of his government to continue standing in solidarity with Uganda in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We appreciate Uganda’s exemplary efforts in the fight against the pandemic. France will always stand in solidarity with Uganda in this common struggle,” he said.

The Prime Minister thanked the French Government and its people for “the generous donation of items that will help in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.”

“This contribution is further testimony of the long standing solidarity between the French people and the people of Uganda,” Nabbanja said, adding that France has ably demonstrated her friendship with Uganda in many ways and consistently over the years.

The Prime Minister called for more international solidarity, especially in accessing COVID-19 vaccines, saying that the fight against COVID-19 is one that can only be won when the international community acts collectively and in solidarity.

This is the latest donation from the French Government given to Uganda since the COVID-19 outbreak in March, last year. Over the last 16 months Uganda has been battling the pandemic, the French Government has extended to Uganda an assortment of utilities including over 50,000 litres of alcohol-based hand sanitizers. These were donated to the national army—the UPDF.

The French Government also donated close to Shs 60 million (€15,000) to support Makerere University’s School of Public Health develop simple rapid low-cost COVID-19 diagnostic test kits.

Last month, the French Government donated 175,200 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccines to Uganda via the Covax Facility— the global initiative through which governments and manufacturers have been working to ensure COVID-19 vaccines are available worldwide to both higher-income and lower-income countries.

Amb. Aniambossou said he was hopeful that the new donation would contribute to the government’s interventions against the new wave.