Covid-19: NIMR directed to research symptoms peculiar to Tanzania

Dar es Salaam. Tanzania's  National Institute for Medical Research (NIMR) was yesterday tasked with conducting research on Covid-19 patients who exhibit symptoms that are not similar to those noted in patients in other countries.
The Deputy Minister of Health,  Community Development, Gender, Elderly and Children, Dr Faustine Ndugulile, told researchers at NIMR that it was imperative to generate country-specific studies that will look into the kind of treatment and management of Covid-19 patients in Tanzania.
Being a new virus, the novel coro-navirus has come with challenges to researchers all over the world.
 In addition to the typical symptoms such as cough, flue, fever, headache and body ache which were ear-lier identified and documented by World Health Organisation (WHO), researchers are establishing additional symptoms.

In a recent study, loss of smell and taste has been anecdotally linked to Covid-19.
In a study published April 12, 2020 in the journal International Forum of Allergy & Rhinology, researchers at UC San Diego Health report the first empirical findings that strongly associate sensory loss with Covid-19.
For Tanzania, Dr Ndugulile yesterday opened doors for researchers to establish if there were any unique symptoms in patients recorded.
He was speaking during a meeting with the researchers to discuss how the coronavirus is spreading and how Covid-19 patients are handled as well as how conducting new studies could help improve management of the viral disease locally.

“There are so many things that, as researchers, you need to invest in now. The first, is about the under-standing of the community about Covid-19, what kind of people in terms of characteristics tend to suf-fer from Covid-19 and the symptoms that have been noted,’’ said Dr Ndugulile.