Senior Gambian research scientists from the ministry of health on Tuesday 31 August 2021, declared that their research team will undergo a nationwide Covid-19 survey to have the estimate of the exposure of covid 19 in the country. The press briefing was held at the national drugs store in Kotu.

Gibril Gando Baldeh, Senior Communication Officer Directorate of Health Communication Unit said the study or survey that they are embarking on is meant to assist the ministry to estimate the exposure of people residing in the country from the onset of the pandemic.

“We are here to introduce the survey before we actually start getting into households to collect samples to determine the level of exposure of the people in this country.

Many people had at some points come across signs and symptoms of Covid-19 that were never tasted to be confirmed at laboratory level. This study is aiming to estimate the number of people who were infected with Covid-19 but never tested to determine their status whether positive or negative. So, this study is here to make sure that it helps the country to have a better understanding as far as Covid-19 cases are concerned,” he said.

He urged Gambians households to cooperate with the research team to have a successful survey that will enable people to better understand the Covid-19 situation and also clear their doubts surrounding the misconception about the pandemic and vaccines.

“This survey will assist the ministry to know the exact age groups that are mostly affected,  their gender, and our routine situational report analysis, which shows the reported 60% of the confirmed cases are under the age of 40. We want to break this down by finding evidence to back these statistics and also to know who are the people most affected and who have died from the pandemic since it was confirmed in the country.”

Director of Health Research Sainey Sanneh said the survey comprises of three specific objectives which they want to accomplish at the end of the survey which are; to have the estimate of the exposure of Covid-19 in the Gambia, to determine the proportion of positive individuals that are actually asymptomatic and the negative individual that are symptomatic, and the final objective is to determine the proportion of positive and negative individuals that reported to have pre existing medical conditions.

“As you know Covid-19 the prevalent is very critical for planning. It includes effective mitigation storages, to understand the true impact of the virus and other relevant interventions in Africa which might be quite different from various regions’ populations, different age distributions, as well as different race profiles.

The information that will be gained from this survey will actually provide critical insight into the transmission and impact to the virus in the African continent, to help countries understand what factors may have influenced this recent transmission.

There is going to be standardization of methodologies in the different countries that are actually going to be implemented in this survey for people to better understand the differences in behaviors of the virus, geographical areas, climatic zones, and mitigation strategies that were employed by different countries.

Gambia is not the only country doing this exercise, several other African countries are also doing it and we are all using the same standard method. The purpose of the survey is to provide an estimate on exposure of Covid-19 in the Gambian population looking at the age and the sect specific cumulative incidence in our population.

He added that the best time for the survey to be conducted should have been before people started administering the vaccines, but due to some technical and other logistical things could not happen as they planned.

However, “we have decided to conduct this exercise and we are doing the study at this time when many other Gambians have received their vaccines. The study is a nationwide exercise but we have selected sides in collaboration with the Gambia Bureau of Statistic. We selected one hundred and fifteen (115) numeration and households where the study will be conducted.

We listed all compounds and households within those areas and in each area we are supposed to select fifteen (15) households where our data collectors will visit for the survey.

The study will be conducted through interviews as well as blood sample collection. We have already trained our field staff who will be conducting the interviews and our laboratory staff for the blood sample collection.

We are going to use RBTs in determining the level of exposure and the level of the field, so the level of the household and RBT is going to be used to get a drop off blood from the participant and to determine whether the person is positive in terms of exposure to covid or negative,” he said.

Sanneh stated that in terms of risk and benefits the investigations poses minimal risk to participant. He said it involves collection of small drop of blood from participants just a pinch on the fingertip and a drop or two on the RBT to determine their status to help in curbing the virus.

“As an individual you may not benefit directly but as a community, and a country this will give us a great benefit in term of the data that is going to be collected, it will help to improve and guide our efforts to understand the extend of covid 19 Infection and better inform our risk communication and to engage the community so that we can prevent the further spread of this virus.

Participants will also be informed of their status thus if you are tested negative this means you have not been exposed to Covid before and if you tested positive it doesn’t means you are presently positive it means you have been exposed to covid 19 before.”

The ministry of health in partnership with the Africa CDC and Gambia Bureau of Statistics in conducting a Sero survey of Covid-19 in this country. The sero survey is actually trying to see the level of exposure of people against covid 19.

According to the research team, the duration of the survey is intended to last for fifteen (15) days and the first team is starting 1st September and the rest 2nd September. And this survey is for non-vaccinated people only.

 

By Dawda Baldeh