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Tanzania president angry as pawpaw and goat test positive for coronavirus

President of Tanzania John Magufuli has cast doubt on the genuineness and quality of imported coronavirus testing kits after they returned positive results on samples taken from a goat and pawpaw.

Tanzania president angry as pawpaw and goat test positive for coronavirus

Speaking at an event in Chato in northwestern Tanzania on Sunday, Magufuli alleged there were "technical errors" with the tests, hence he had instructed Tanzanian security forces to check the quality of the kits.

Reports say the country’s health officials had randomly obtained several non-human samples, including from pawpaw, a goat and a sheep, but had assigned them human names and ages before submitting them to Tanzania's laboratory to test for the coronavirus

Interestingly, the lab technicians had not had any clue about the origins of the samples submitted to them for testing.

To the surprise of the government, samples from the pawpaw and the goat tested positive for COVID-19, making the president suspect that some people who were being tested positive for the deadly virus may not have been infected after all.

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"There is something happening. I said before we should not accept that every aid is meant to be good for this nation," Magufuli said, adding the kits should be investigated.

Meanwhile, Magululi further announced that he had placed an order for a herbal treatment for the coronavirus touted by the president of Madagascar which some African countries seem to be in a mad rush to procure for the treatment of the coronavirus pandemic.

"I have already written to Madagascar's president and we will soon dispatch a plane to fetch the medicine so that Tanzania can also benefit from it," he said.

Called "Covid Organics", the herbal concoction was prepared by the Malagasy Institute for Applied Research out of Artemisia, a plant cultivated on the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar.

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Although there is no scientific evidence of the efficacy of "Covid Organics”, President Andry Rajoelina of Madagascar claimed that the remedy has already been used to cure some Madagascans of COVID-19.

As of Monday, May 4, 2020, Madagascar's number of confirmed cases for the virus stands at 149, with 99 recoveries and no death recorded.

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