Cameroon has ruled out government funding free PCR COVID-19 testing, according to a note of information by the Secretary-General at the Presidency, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh.
Ngoh said in the note late Thursday that the test will now cost 30,000 xaf (about 49.68 US dollars).
He did not explain why the decision was taken but public health expert Robert Djomo told Xinhua that the government cannot afford to continue spending on preventing the spread of COVID-19 at the same rate it did in 2020 and 2021.
“Government invested a lot of money to curb the pandemic, making everything, from test to treatment free of charge. Now that has to change at this stage,” Djomo said.
The decision came a day after the country’s Minister of Public Health, Malachie Manaouda reported that there has been no new case of COVID-19 in the Central African region for seven consecutive days.
On Thursday, Manaouda said in a tweet that there were 119,780 positive COVID-19 cases, 117,791 recoveries and 1,927 deaths as of Wednesday. Enditem
