Medics want COVID-19 screening protocol revised

Kampala, Uganda |  THE INDEPENDENT | Medical workers are calling for the revision of the screening protocol for COVID-19. They want the health ministry to remove screening for temperature.

According to the medics, high temperature should not be the most relied upon symptom of COVID-19 because the majority of COIVD-19 positive cases do not develop any symptoms. Figures from the health ministry indicate that 85 percent of Ugandans who test positive for the disease are asymptomatic.

The doctors say while high temperatures and fevers were some of the most common symptoms that positive cases exhibited at the onset of the pandemic in the country, this is no longer the case.

The medics want the government to revise its screening protocol and include other symptoms that are becoming more common. Today, six out of every ten patients in the country present with a loss of appetite or sense of smell according to the health ministry.

Dr Richard Idro, the President of the Uganda Medical Association says that in public places like schools, supermarkets and churches where the temperature guns are used as the main tool for screening for COVID need to adopt new measures. 

Idro suggests that instead of relying on temperature guns, practices like hand washing and wearing mask should be encouraged. 

Dr Robert Lubega, the Deputy Secretary-General of UMA says that the temperature guns are now irrelevant. 

Dr Eboga Haji, a medical officer at Kityereratte HCIV in located in Mayuge district says that more aggressive screening is needed. He says that forms asking for travel history and also introducing Rapid Diagnostic Kits-RDTs will be more helpful than screening for temperature.    

But Dr Frank Asiimwe, a surgeon says that the use of temperature as a diagnostic symptom should not be rubbished because it still identified at least in a third of the cases.

In addition to this, the medics say the improper use of temperature guns by security guards at some public places with some not being calibrated make the device unreliable. Dr Lubega says screening for temperature cannot be relied upon as a reliable diagnostic element of the disease. 

“At times you walk into a supermarket and the temperature gun shows that you are 30 degrees. This is not right. Yet when you try to tell the person at the entrance that their machine is faulty, How can you rely on a machine like that?” he said.

The director of curative services at the ministry of health, Dr Charles Olaro says thermometers cannot be left out of diagnosing the disease.

“COVID is a new disease and such we are constantly learning from it. If many people do not exhibit high temperatures we cannot say the temperature guns are useless and we should not use them. Some people show up with high temperatures, “he said.

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