{"id":390253,"date":"2020-04-16T16:39:21","date_gmt":"2020-04-16T14:39:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=390253"},"modified":"2020-04-16T16:50:36","modified_gmt":"2020-04-16T14:50:36","slug":"us-announces-additional-coronavirus-financial-support-for-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/390253\/us-announces-additional-coronavirus-financial-support-for-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"US announces additional coronavirus financial support for South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"

The United States government is committing<\/a> <\/strong>additional funds to support South Africa\u2019s response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the US embassy to South Africa said in a statement on Thursday (16 April).<\/p>\n

The total funding commitment from the US now stands at approximately $2,770,000 (R51.5 million). Previously the United States\u00a0<\/span>g<\/span>overnment\u00a0<\/span>committed $970,000<\/span>,\u00a0<\/span>including the first $500,000 announced on 11 March<\/span>,\u00a0<\/span>to the Covid-19 response in South Africa, the embassy said.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Today\u2019s announcement provides an additional $1.8 million in funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID)\u2019s Emergency Reserve Fund,” it said.<\/p>\n

“This funding will support the South African government\u2019s critical needs, including surveillance rapid response, case management, and risk communication.”<\/p>\n

The embassy said that the United States Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is also providing technical assistance to South Africa\u2019s National Department of Health (<\/span>NDoH<\/span>) and National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD).<\/span><\/p>\n

This support will be focused on containing the spread of this virus and mitigating its impact in South Africa, it said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

“These efforts include work by public health experts to assist our partners in developing guidelines for risk communication, identification, isolation, testing, and contact tracing for persons under investigation (PUI) for COVID-19.<\/span><\/p>\n

“The US CDC is also developing a virus shedding protocol to estimate disease burden, risk factors, and transmission dynamics, which will help inform public health protocols to stop transmission of the disease and save lives.<\/span><\/p>\n

“On the frontline, the US CDC has deployed staff to the\u202f<\/span>NDoH<\/span> and NICD to support data entry activities and support at the provincial level.”<\/span><\/p>\n

WHO funding\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The announcement comes after US president Donald Trump made the controversial decision to cut funding to the World Health Organisation for a perceived failure to control the coronavirus.<\/p>\n

In a statement on Thursday (16 April),\u00a0 the South African government said that it was is \u2018very concerned\u2019 and \u2018alarmed\u2019\u00a0 by the announcement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is alarming that this very regrettable decision is announced as this deadly virus strikes Africa and the poorest and most vulnerable states,” it said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe WHO, as the lead UN Agency, is mandated to promote health and to ensure universal health coverage globally, is tasked to lead global efforts to suppress the transmission and stop the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is the sole global health agency, with the core focus on universal healthcare. As such, its efforts to coordinate a genuinely global response against this scourge should be recognized and supported.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Read: South African government \u2018alarmed\u2019 by Trump\u2019s decision to cut WHO funding<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The United States government is committing additional funds to support South Africa\u2019s response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the US embassy to South Africa said in a statement on Thursday (16 April).\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":266873,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-390253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390253"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390253\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":390261,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390253\/revisions\/390261"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}