While debate rages in France over Professor Didier Raoult’s recommendation of a mixture of chloroquine (an antimalarial) and azithromycin (an antibiotic) to treat patients with Covid-19, some African countries have taken it very seriously. Such is the case in Cameroon, which has embraced the French professor’s method of treatment.

Despite having authorised treatment in a very restricted manner for serious cases, France has shown scepticism regarding a dual therapy combining chloroquine (an antimalarial), or its derivative hydroxychloroquine, and azithromycin (an antibiotic used for lung and ENT infections and angina) to treat patients suffering from Covid-19. On April 22, France’s Health Minister Olivier Véran said the most recent publications from clinical studies were not in favour of the dual therapy. Six days later, during a speech on France’s strategy for lifting its Covid-19 lockdown, Prime Minister Édouard Philippe clearly reaffirmed the government’s position: “To date, no treatment has proven effective.”

The debate surrounding the protocol of Dr Didier Raoult, the director of the University Hospital Institute (IHU) Méditerranée Infection in the southern city of Marseille, continues to divide the country’s medical community. But while some French professionals consider the treatment too toxic and doubt its effectiveness, many African countries, already accustomed to anti-malarial drugs, have decided in favour of the reseacher and professor. This is notably the case in Cameroon, which has adopted Raoult’s dual therapy.

Although the country increased its knowledge of epidemics following the appearance of Ebola in the region, its medical capacities remain limited and a European-style scenario, with a multiplication of serious Covid-19 cases, could lead to a catastrophe. In mid-March, as the epidemic began to spread across Cameroon and European countries, already hard hit, launched lockdown plans, the first video of Raoult selling the effectiveness of his protocol was widely shared on Cameroonian social networks, raising great hopes. In a country where part of the population still has major difficulties in accessing healthcare, the prospect of a treatment based on accessible, inexpensive and familiar drugs appeared to be a blessing.

A chloroquine treatment

On March 27, in a memorandum from Cameroon’s Ministry of Health, the country’s scientific council proposed the widespread use of chloroquine treatment. Judged “promising”, the treatment could make it possible to reduce viral load and contagiousness, even if the group of scientists acknowledged a “lack of conclusive data”. Finally, the council wished to combine the treatment, as recommended by Raoult, with azithromycin to avoid the risks of secondary infections. On April 9, the protocol was validated for the management of all types of patients with positive Covid-19 tests, from asymptomatic cases to patients suffering from severe infections.

“With the arrival of the first cases, the clinicians were tempted to try the protocols themselves, and it was necessary to give clear instructions quickly to organise the response,” explained Dr Alain Etoundi, director of the fight against disease, epidemics and pandemics at Cameroon’s Ministry of Health, to FRANCE 24.

“The question of the supposed toxicity of chloroquine has been addressed and dismissed by the council. So far, the results that are coming to us seem satisfactory, but the evaluation of the treatment is ongoing,” he said.

A ‘national hero’

Professor William Ngatchou is a cardiovascular surgeon at the General Hospital in Douala, the economic capital of Cameroon. When FRANCE 24 asked him if he had heard of Professor Raoult, he responded with amusement: “Everyone knows Professor Raoult in Cameroon! Some even consider him like a national hero.” Like many health professionals in the country, Ngatchou thinks that the effectiveness of dual therapy combining an antimalarial and an antibiotic has been proven: “It’s been almost two months that this protocol has been in use for patients with Covid-19. I myself have noticed significant improvements in patients with its use, and the debate about the side effects of chloroquine seems very exaggerated to me.”

Seven weeks after the detection of the first Covid-19 case on Cameroonian soil, there are more than 2,050 confirmed cases in the country. The progress of the virus seems, as in many African countries, to be much slower than indicated by scientific modelling. Nevertheless, Etoundi asserted that treatment is only one element of a global health policy and it is far too early to claim victory: “We are in a phase where the disease is on the rise and the peak has not yet been reached. Anything is still possible.”

Supply problems and a black market explosion

Beyond a public health resolution, the choice of dual therapy represents a logistical challenge in Cameroon. For while chloroquine was massively used in the country at one time, it has been several decades since it lost its effectiveness in the fight against malaria and was replaced by other, more effective drugs. “Stocks were totally exhausted, we had to place large orders abroad and restart national industrial production,” explained Etoundi.

In Cameroon, public hospitals have been selected to centralise Covid-19 patients. In theory, stocks of chloroquine and azithromycin are sufficient there, although a source within medical services, contacted by FRANCE 24, reported occasional shortages. But the situation is more complex in the pharmaceutical sector. Private pharmacies, very important in Cameroon, sometimes play the role of doctor, and they are not authorized to sell chloroquine.

“As soon as we started talking about the disease in March, a lot of people wanted to buy stocks of chloroquine from us, some aggressively. Others came to try to sell us some,” a pharmacist in a working-class neighbourhood in Douala told FRANCE 24. “Here, demand for the Covid treatment is exploding, we quadrupled our sales of azithromycin between March and April. Since we don’t have chloroquine, customers have switched to similar antimalarial drugs like Artequin, which is already out of stock at wholesalers,” she said.

The black market for drugs, already flourishing in normal times in Cameroon, is on the rise with the Covid-19 crisis. The authorities have already issued several alerts about the circulation of fake chloroquine within the health network.

Finally, another subject that worries the government is the disappearance of hydroxychloroquine, the chloroquine derivative,  also recommended by Professor Raoult. It was previously sold over the counter in pharmacies and was very little used, because it was reserved for the treatment of specific diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. “The shelves have been robbed very quickly, yet patients depend on these drugs. They now find themselves destitute and we must find solutions to protect them,” Etoundi said.

This article is a translation of the original in French as reported by France 24

A separatist commander known simply as General Alhaji was among some insurgents who were killed on Friday in Bafut, a locality in Northwest, one of the two troubled Anglophone regions of Cameroon, the Cameroon army said Saturday.

The death of Alhaji was confirmed by Kingsley Ashu, a separatist leader, in a Facebook post.

He was killed after a week-long military offensive in the locality that also witnessed the seizure of war weapons and dismantling of several separatist camps, local authorities said.

Alhaji was commanding one of the “largest and fiercest” armed separatist groups known as “Seven Katta Bafut Defence forces” in the region, according to security reports.

He became “notorious” in 2018 after kidnapping over 80 school children and teachers and a driver of a secondary school in Bamenda, Cameroon Anglophone’s largest city, security sources said, adding that his physical elimination could prove a major blow to the rebels in that region.

Since 2017, government forces have been clashing with armed separatist forces who want the two English-speaking regions of Northwest and Southwest to secede from the majority French-speaking nation and form a new country which they call “Ambazonia.”

Source: Xinhuanet

A political group from Yaoundé and a sea of French Cameroun army soldiers posing as bike riders heavily funded by French Cameroun’s Minister of Territorial Administration, Paul Atanga Nji have organized a raucous rally in Bamenda, the chief city in the Northern Zone of Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia calling on the occupying Biya regime to reform bike laws in the Mezam County. The participants did wear protective masks not as an anti COVID-19 gesture but to hide their identities from Ambazonia Restoration Forces. The Atanga Nji militia men did not observe social distancing recommendations.

Cameroon Intelligence Report gathered from a well-placed source in Yaoundé that the protest was organized and funded by the French Cameroun Minister of Territorial Administration with many of the participants transported to Bamenda from French Cameroun’s West Region.

Despite Mezam County having the highest number of French Cameroun military operations in recent times, along with nearly 98 deaths in Bafut, French Cameroun surrogate, Minister Paul Atanga Nji reportedly fighting for his political survival sponsored the Bamenda demonstration to give the impression that the Mezam County was now under the control of the Francophone dominated army.

One of the participants who spoke to our correspondent claimed Minister Atanga Nji did not sponsor the demonstration but that it was financed from Yaoundé.

The Ambazonia Vice President Dabney Yerima is expected to chair a town hall meeting in the coming days to redirect the Southern Cameroons struggle to self defense.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Frédéric  Nguiema Nzie a Sub-Lieutenant of the French Cameroun army recently assigned to head an operation with the Rapid Intervention Battalion (RIB) has been killed by Ambazonia Restoration Forces in Mamfe, the chief town in the Manyu County.

Sub-Lieutenant Frédéric Jeunesse Nguiema Nzie, enlisted in the Rapid Intervention Battalion (BIR), and deployed as part of the 6^th Division died on April 28, 2020 during an operation around the residence of the Senior Divisional Officer for Manyu.

French Cameroun media reported that he served the Biya regime only for four months and made what Yaoundé described as the supreme sacrifice.

The young soldier from La Republique du Cameroun was a laureate of the 37th badge of EMIA named after Major General Jacob KODJI who including 181 others graduated on January 24^th in a ceremony that was chaired by the French Cameroun monarch Paul Biya. He hailed from Kribi in the Ocean constituency in French Cameroun.

Oke Akombi Ayukepi Akap in Glasgow with files from CIN

The wife of a former French Cameroun Minister of Defence, Bernadette Mebe Ngo’o who has been in prison since the 11^th of March 2019 alongside her husband, Edgar Alain Mebo Ngo’o for complicity in a case of alleged embezzlement of public funds in the purchase of military equipment for the French Cameroun army, was rushed to intensive care on Saturday, 25^th of April 2020, at the Yaoundé Emergency Centre.

Bernadette Mebe Ngo’o was reportedly taken from her detention cell in Ward 5 of the Yaounde-Kondengui Central Prison and nothing has so far filtered about the woman who was prominent in French Cameroun some few years ago.

Cameroon Concord News gathered that Bernadette Minja Nkoulou (to use her name at birth) has suffered several minor heart attacks in recent months and has been abandoned by the ruling CPDM female mafia known as the Circle of Friends of Cameroun (CERAC), founded by the First Lady, Mrs. Chantal Biya.

By Asu Isong in London

Three government officials were abducted Friday night in Boyo division of Northwest, one of the two troubled Anglophone regions of Cameroon, local authorities said Saturday.

A Court registrar of Boyo High Court, an official of election management body Elections Cameroon (Elecam), and a municipal councillor of ruling Cameroon’s People Democratic Movement (CPDM), were kidnapped by gunmen “as they were going about their normal activities”, according to security sources who asked not to be named.

Local police said a search and rescue mission of the hostages is underway.

Armed separatists have intensified attacks on officials who participated in Feb. 9 legislative and municipal elections in Cameroon, saying they disrespected their order to boycott the elections, according to media reports.

Since 2017, armed separatists have been fighting to create an independent nation in the two Anglophone regions of the largely French-speaking Cameroon.

Source: Xinhuanet

Thousands of Cameroonian prisoners have effectively regained their freedom, as ordered by the central African state’s President Paul Biya, after his government reported that the coronavirus pandemic was spreading and inmates were among the groups with the highest level of exposure. The government has, however, not provided the number of infected inmates but says more than 1,500 people have been tested COVID-19 positive in Cameroon  in less than two months, with over 50 deaths.

Speaking via a messaging application from Cameroon’s English-speaking northwestern town of Bamenda Henry Asaah Ngu, superintendent of the Bamenda Central prison says the 138 inmates who have regained their freedom were all tested COVID-19-free. He says their departure makes it possible for prison staff to ensure that compliance with principles of hygiene is effective to check the spread of the coronavirus.

“With this release, we will be able to apply very strictly that aspect of social distancing even within the prison,” he said.

The Bamenda Central Prison has 403 officially declared inmates. Cameroon has 78 overcrowded prisons, with 30,000 prisoners in detention facilities constructed for a maximum of 9.000 inmates.

Among the 1,400 who have regained their freedom from the Bamenda, Bafoussam, Bertoua and Buea central prisons is Emmanuel Ngomba. He says he was arrested two years ago, at 16, and held at the Buea Central Prison.

“I left the house one evening to go and see a friend. He said he wanted us to go and take some things from his uncle’s shop. We went there, took some gas bottles and engine oil. They [the police] caught me. Prison is not a good place,” he said.

Ngumba, who spoke via a messaging application, said his rights were abused because he was accused of theft and detained in prison for two years without trial.

Fifty-two-year-old Pierre Tchamba also regained his freedom after more than two dozen years in the Bertoua prison, where he was given a life sentence for voluntary manslaughter and aggravated theft.

Tchamba says after 24 years and four months of detention in inhumane conditions, he has finally regained his freedom thanks to COVID-19, which has been spreading in Cameroon and infecting inmates.

A crisis meeting chaired by Cameroonian Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute last week announced that COVID-19 was a threat in Cameroon prisons but did not say how many inmates had been contaminated or have died from the pandemic.

On April 15, President Biya ordered the release of thousands of prisoners over concerns about congested facilities spreading the coronavirus. Under the presidential decision, life sentences were reduced to 25 years and those for whom life sentences had been reduced to 25 years had five years taken off their sentences. Ten-year sentences were cut by three years, five-year sentences reduced by two years and three-year sentences cut by one year.

However, separatists fighting for an independent English-speaking state in the central African nation and officials jailed for corruption were excluded.

Source: VOA

Southern Cameroons Secretary of the Economy, Comrade Tabenyang Brado has reportedly chaired a process to reconcile all of Manyu self defense groups and donors to the Ambazonia struggle and quest for an independent state, taking a more hands-on approach to solving the main problem.

In a heavily attended Manyu Town Hall Meeting that held yesterday Sunday the 26^th of April 2020, Tabenyang Brado including a cream of senior Manyu citizens and the Chairman of the Manyu County Sesekou Dr Ako Peter explained to Manyus that there was an urgent need to maintain only defense structures during these difficult times.

The Ambazonia Economy Secretary supported by prominent Manyu titles holders had attempted late last week to resolve a serious issue that saw Manyu Restoration Forces fighting among themselves in the Mamfe Local Government Area.  However, yesterday’s meeting made huge efforts to end the Manyu rift and a real pact has been sealed with the outcome of the talks described by many as positive.

A high-ranking source in the Southern Cameroons intelligence who attended the Manyu Town Hall Meeting told Cameroon Intelligence Report on condition of anonymity that the new Manyu Self Defense plan as designed by the organizers of the town hall is more structured than previous ones. The new Manyu vision focuses on completing the liberation of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia step by step and guaranteeing the security of every Southern Cameroonian in Ground Zero.

Cameroon Concord News Group London Bureau Chief Asu Isong said all stakeholders agreed to the new vision and all were positive. We understand the Ambazonian leader, President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe has expressed his sincere gratitude to all his fellow Manyu Community members for putting the struggle first with their new commitment to support and assist the suffering people on Ground Zero and Ground 1.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai in Dublin

Cameroon customs on Tuesday seized 210 cartons of fake anti-malaria medication chloroquine in Ngaoundere, chief town of the mountainous region of Adamawa.

Thousands of fake tablets were almost smuggled into the country through neighbouring Nigeria.

Cameroon customs was alerted by the World Customs Organisation when the cargo vehicle carrying the fake medication was returning from Nigeria. The driver was stopped for identity and document checks but failed to provide marketing authorisation and a technical visa for the tablets, said Epoh Mbappe, a senior customs official, adding that those transporting the drugs have been remanded in custody.

Officials said Cameroon has seen a rise in the production and proliferation of fake chloroquine, as people rush to obtain the anti-malaria drug in the unproven belief it can prevent the infection of COVID-19.

Last week, health authorities in the country announced they had shut down six pharmaceutical companies that were producing and selling counterfeit drugs.

Source: Xinhuanet