South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa said the government had "decided to enforce a nationwide lockdown for 21 days" from midnight Thursday to "avoid a human catastrophe". There have been more than 400 coronavirus cases in Africa's most developed economy -- the highest in sub-Saharan Africa -- with the number multiplying six-fold in just eight days. Ramaphosa said the numbers could spiral given that South Africa has "a large number of people with suppressed immunity because of high HIV and TB and high levels of poverty and malnutrition." Fellow West African nation Ivory Coast ordered a similar curfew, as well as progressive confinements measures based on the geographic spread of the virus. - Rising cases -Africa hasn't yet suffered the kind of terrifying rise in virus cases seen elsewhere.

Source: The North Africa Journal March 24, 2020 03:56 UTC