Meeting suspended after 2 Kabarak University staff contract virus

A Ministry of Education meeting at Kabarak University in Nakuru County was suspended on Monday after two of the institution's staff tested positive for Covid-19.

Tension gripped the more than 150 officials of the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) and other education stakeholders after it emerged that two women who had attended to some of them had contracted the virus.

Alex Kiprotich, aide to Kabarak University's Gideon Moi, said the Institution facilitated the testing of staff at Kabarak Guest House last Thursday and that it does so from time to time.

“On June 28, we got the results. Two of the samples tested positive. The county response team took the necessary steps to isolate the cases. The contacts have also been quarantined after tracing,” Mr Kiprotich said in a statement,” noting the health officials acted swiftly.

DIRECTIVES

A KICD official who attended the meeting said that about 30 people were staying at the guest house and the rest at the university’s hostels.

“Those who were at the hostels have been taken back to Nairobi in KICD buses while those of us who stayed at the hostels have been asked to stay here and wait for directives from the county health officials’,” said the official who requested anonymity.

Later, County Health Services Chief Officer, Samuel King'ori, met the officials who were staying at the guest house and asked them to disperse, but not before signing declaration forms committing to quarantine for 14 days.

“We have been released and urged to use private means home and to quarantine ourselves. However, those who were staying at the hostels were picked by ministry vans and buses and taken back to Nairobi,” the official said.

One of the employees, the official said, works at the reception and handled almost all those who arrived for the meeting on Thursday and Saturday.

Sources at the university told the Nation that 25 samples were collected from university staffers on Thursday.