Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Mahamat has stated that the travel restrictions that trailed the emergence of the Omicron COVID-19 variant is an injustice against the continent.<\/p>\n
This was stated by Mahamat\u00a0during a news conference at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Omicron \u2014 labelled a \u201cvariant of concern\u201d \u2014 was detected by South African authorities and subsequently reported to the World Health Organisation (WHO).<\/p>\n
Subsequently, several countries in the developed world imposed a travel ban on South Africa and its neighboring countries.<\/p>\n
The Canadian government also banned travellers from Nigeria and nine other African countries.<\/p>\n
Mahamat described the development as stigmatisation that could not be justified scientifically or logically.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are condemning a country (South Africa) for having been transparent because its experts have worked tirelessly to inform the international community of the emergence of new variants,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt hasn\u2019t been scientifically proven that these types of measures are able to deal with this type of issue. It\u2019s clearly, as you say, an expression rather of a form of injustice. It\u2019s immoral to condemn Africa in that way.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are a world, a global world and when facing an enemy like the virus, like COVID-19, humankind as a whole must go hand in hand to fight the virus because a man\u2019s life is man\u2019s life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mahamat said African leaders need to be \u201ccollectively outraged\u201d about the development.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur message to the world as a whole is that we need to keep a cool head. We need to follow the well-being of humankind as a whole,\u201d he added<\/p>\n
Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Mahamat has stated that the travel restrictions that trailed the emergence of the Omicron COVID-19 variant is an injustice against the continent. This was stated by Mahamat\u00a0during a news conference at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday. Omicron \u2014 labelled a \u201cvariant of concern\u201d \u2014 was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":115403,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_bookmark_settings":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[8634,5209,3609,23781],"class_list":["post-115390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa","tag-african-countries","tag-african-union","tag-new-york","tag-omicron-covid-19"],"yoast_head":"\n