Supporting the fight against Covid-19

Since its outbreak in November 2019 in China, Covid-19 has disrupted the daily lives of people around the world. In Africa, the first proven case was diagnosed in mid-February 2020. Since then, the coronavirus disease has been on the rise. To deal with it, all the people concerned in the health sector are on board. Eutelsat is participating in this response through its Konnect satellite Internet service.

The coronavirus epidemic: an unprecedented global crisis

Wearing masks everywhere, decisions to confine populations, closing certain borders, stopping air links, curfews... no one could have imagined what was going to happen when Covid-19 appeared.Measures that follow one another and are superimposed in order to contain the spread of this disease that has already caused the death of several million people around the world.

And coronavirus is not sparing the African continent with more than 3 million infections and 96,000 deaths according to WHO figures as of 11 February 2021. Among the countries most affected in sub-Saharan Africa are South Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria and Zimbabwe. In addition, the variant detected in South Africa, which is 1.5 times more contagious, raises fears that the epidemic will accelerate.

How is Konnect supporting the DRC, South Africa and Nigeria in the face of Covid-19?

The health authorities and political bodies are facing an unprecedented situation that requires the involvement of all. Eutelsat has chosen to mobilise its teams for the fight against Covid-19 in three countries in particular: the DRC, South Africa and Nigeria. This policy of solidarity is not new, as the company has chosen to help the victims of Cyclone Idai in Mozambique in 2019.

What are the actions implemented by konnect in the fight against the pandemic? Here are some of them:

• In the DRC: Eutelsat is offering the installation of its Konnect satellite Internet service free of charge to all offices in charge of coordinating actions to combat the coronavirus;
• In South Africa: eight clinics located in remote areas of the Mpumalanga region are now equipped with the konnect service;
• In Nigeria: quarantine centres located in the Sokoto region benefit from a free broadband Internet connection to carry out their activities and promote telemedicine.