Countrywide vaccination started few hours after receiving three batches of vaccines including AstraZeneca and Pfizer types.
In general, vaccines were administered at 45 hospitals and over 500 health centers starting with health workers, elders above 65, community health workers, security forces and people with chronic diseases like blood pressure, diabetes among others.
The Ministry of Health has announced that the vaccination exercise continues this Saturday.
2,051 of vaccinated people are from Kigali city, 15,007 are from Northern Province, and 21,812 are from Southern Province, 20, 072 from Eastern Province while 16,114 people have been vaccinated in Western Province.
The statement released yesterday shows that a 40-year old man from Kigali died of Coronavirus bringing death toll to 267.
Among others, 92 new cases have been found out of 4534 sample tests while 69 recovered.
Rwanda confirmed the first Coronavirus case on 14th March 2020. Since then, 19426 people have been tested positive out of 1,029,747 sample tests of whom 17751 have recovered, 1418 are active cases while 11 people are critically ill.
Despite the commencement of vaccination program, Rwandans are advised to continue adhering to instituted preventive measures.
Coronavirus symptoms include coughing, flu, and difficulty in breathing. The virus is said to be transmitted through the mucous membranes of the respiratory tract.
Rwandans are urged to adhere to COVID-19 health guidelines, washing hands frequently using soaps and safe water, wearing face masks and respecting social distancing.
So far, Rwanda has received 397,000 vaccines in three shipments including 102,960 Pfizer doses, 240000 AstraZeneca doses distributed through COVAX initiative facilitating equal distribution of vaccines in developing countries as well as more 50,000 AstraZeneca vaccine donations from the Government of India.
Rwanda targets to vaccinate 60% of the population before the end of 2022.
Discussions with other countries, manufacturers and various partners are ongoing to acquire enough vaccines.
-* { {{On April 14, 1912, the RMS Titanic hit an iceberg while on its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York
-* Within three hours, the ‘unsinkable’ ship had sunk in freezing Atlantic Ocean, killing more than 1,500 people
-* New book Titanic – ‘Iceberg Ahead’, by James Bancroft, uses survivor testimonies to describe what happened
-* Perfume salesman Adolph Saalfeld recalled hearing ‘pitiful cries’ of people drowning as lifeboat sailed away
-* Picture framer Joseph Hyman recalled being awoken by the ‘terrible shock’ of the ship hitting iceberg}} }
At just before midnight on April 14, 1912, the RMS Titanic hit an iceberg while travelling on its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York.
Within three hours, the ‘unsinkable’ ship had slipped beneath the waves of the freezing Atlantic Ocean, killing more than 1,500 people.
At its launch, the luxurious Titanic was the largest ship in the world, and was carrying some of the wealthiest people in the world, as well as hundreds of people from Britain, Ireland, and elsewhere who were seeking a new life in the United States.
Whilst the story of the disaster has been told many times, a new book uses the vivid witness accounts of 50 of the 705 people who survived to bring the horror of what occurred back to life.
James W Bancroft in Titanic: ‘Iceberg Ahead’, includes testimony from people such as perfume salesman Adolph Saalfeld, who heard the ‘pitiful cries’ of drowning victims as his packed lifeboat pulled away.
Stewardess Violet Jessop, who went on to survive two other shipping disasters, recalled how a baby was ‘dropped into my lap’ as her lifeboat was being lowered into the water.
And picture framer Joseph Hyman described how he ‘didn’t think’ that the ‘terrible shock’ of the ‘bang and a rip’ which awoke him – the force of the Titanic hitting the fateful iceberg – could be ‘anything serious’.
Below, MailOnline retells some of the survivors’ accounts and sheds previously untold light on their lives.
{{Picture framer Joseph Hyman}}
The iceberg which sank the Titanic was first spotted at 11.40pm by lookout Frederick Fleet. He rang the ship’s bell and told the bridge: ‘Iceberg! Right ahead!’.
Whilst the enormous ship changed heading just in time to avoid a head-on collision, the change in direction caused it to his the iceberg at an angle.
A spur of ice beneath the water gauged a huge opening in the Titanic’s hull, causing water to flood in.
Within two-and-a-half hours, the ship had split in two and sunk beneath the waves.
Hyman was a third-class passenger of the Titanic and was going to America to join his brother Harry.
He was hoping to set up a new life before his wife and family would join him once established.
The picture framer had been in bed for more than two hours when he felt the jolt of the ship striking the iceberg.
His cabin was two decks down from the top deck and was near the front of the ship.
He said: ‘It must have been about half-past-eleven when I was awakened by a terrible shock.
‘There was only one – just a bang and a rip – lasting a couple of seconds. Then everything was quiet.
‘I didn’t know what had happened, but never dreamed it could be anything serious, so lay in my bunk for twenty minutes listening.’
Hyman got up from his bed and dressed himself before going down the passage outside his cabin.
He then went up to the top deck and ‘stood a full twenty minutes’.
‘I knew the ship had hit something, but I didn’t think it could be anything serious – I don’t believe anybody on board suspected anything serious,’ he added.
After recuperating in New York following the disaster, Hyman went on to set up a delicatessen in Manchester.
He died at the age of 75 in March 1956.
{{Perfume seller Adolf Saalfeld }}
Adolf Saalfeld, who was born in Germany in 1865, moved to England when he was 20 and became chairman of a chemist’s merchants in Manchester.
He boarded the Titanic as a first-class passenger. His cabin was opposite that of John Jacob Astor VI, the wealthiest man on board.
Saalfeld was travelling to America to present a selection of perfumes which he was carrying in 65 glass bottles.
Incredibly, all three of these bottles were recovered from the Atlantic sea bed in 2000.
Saalfeld provided initial accounts of his plush surroundings on board the Titanic, noting the lunch he had of ‘soup, fillet of plaice, a loin chop with cauliflower and fried potatoes’.
That description is in stark contrast to his later words when he was in one of the ship’s lifeboats as it pulled away from the sinking Titanic.
He said: ‘As we drifted away we gradually saw Titanic sink lower and lower and finally her lights went out, and others in my boat said they saw her disappear.
‘Our boat was nearly two miles away but pitiful cries could be plainly heard.’
Starkly, he added that everyone could have survived if there had been enough lifeboats.
‘No one in our boat knew how many lifeboats were on Titanic but … there was ample time for saving every soul on board had there been sufficient boats,’ he said.
Saalfeld said that the crew of the Carpathia ‘did all that was possible’ to make him and his fellow survivors ‘comfortable’ and tend to the sick and injured.
‘The icebergs were huge and the weather extremely rough on the voyage to New York,’ he said.
Mr Bancroft states that Saalfeld was traumatised by his experiences and returned to England ‘with his dreams shattered’.
He was ‘haunted’ by the horrors for the rest of his life and found great difficulty sleeping.
He died on June 5, 1926, at Kew in Surrey.
{{Junior officer Harold Bride}}
Harold Bride, who was born in 1890, in Nunhead, South-East London, had served as a Marconi Wireless operator before being appointed as a junior officer on the Titanic.
He noted how he ‘didn’t even feel the shock’ of the iceberg striking the cruise ship.
Its captain Edward Smith, 62, came into his cabin to tell him ‘we’ve struck an iceberg’ before adding: ‘You better get ready to send out a call for assistance. But don’t send it until I tell you.’
Bride added that he and his fellow crew could hear a ‘terrible confusion’ but that there was not ‘the least thing to indicate any trouble’.
The captain then re-emerged to order him to send the assistance call. Several ships responded, but the closest – the passenger liner RMS Carpathia – was 58 miles away.
Bride recalled how the decks were now full of ‘scrambling men and women’.
The Titanic’s lifeboats could only carry 1,178 people, far short of the total number of passengers.
As water continued to gush into the ship, Bride noted how the lifeboats were launched and women and children were being put in them.
‘The captain came and told us that our engine rooms were taking water and that the dynamos might not last much longer.
‘We sent those facts to the Carpathia. I went on deck and looked around. The water was pretty close up to the boat deck,’ he recalled.
Amid the scramble escape the ship, as passengers sought to find space in lifeboats, Bride noted how the ship’s band continued to play.
The scene was depicted in James Cameron’s 1997 film, which starred Leonardo Di Caprio and Kate Winslet.
‘I guess all the band went down,’ Bride said. ‘They were heroes. They were still playing Autumn’.
Later, Bride said Captain Smith’s order came though to abandon the ship.
‘Abandon your cabin now. It’s every man for himself. You look out for yourselves. I release you.’
Bride was then pushed into the sea by a wave as he tried to push one of the lifeboats into the water.
He became trapped underneath the boat, which was upside down.
‘I knew I had to fight for it and I did. How I got out from under the boat I do not know, but I felt a breath of air at last,’ he said.
‘There were men all around me – hundreds of them. The sea was dotted with them, all depending on their lifebelts.’
He noted that the ‘beautiful’ ship was ‘gradually turning on her nose’, ‘just like a duck does that goes down for a dive’.
‘Then I swam with all my might. I suppose I was 150 feet away when Titanic, on her nose, with her after-quarter sticking straight up into the air, began to settle slowly,’ he said.
‘When at last the waves washed over her rudder there wasn’t the least bit of suction I could feel. She must have kept going down just as flowing as she had been. That was her end.’
Bride survived after he was hauled into a lifeboat. He recalled being ‘very cold’ before the Carpathia finally arrived and people were taken on to the ship by a rope ladder.
The officer later spent time in hospital suffering from badly frozen and crushed feet.
{{Ship steward Tom Whiteley }}
Tom Whiteley, who was born in 1894, in Highgate, London, was working on the Titanic as a steward in the first class dining saloon.
He recalled being awoken at 11.30pm to be told by a shipmate about the ship striking the iceberg.
‘I looked out of the porthole, the sea was like glass and I did not believe him,’ he said.
Later, during the panicked minutes when the lifeboats went into the water, he recalled how the ship’s officers drew their revolvers.
‘The chief officer shot one man – I didn’t see this, but three others did – and then he shot himself,’ he said.
Whiteley ended up in the water and found himself clinging to ‘an oak dresser’ which he said was the same size as the hospital bed from which he was later treated.
‘I wasn’t more than sixty feet from Titanic when she went down. I was aft and could see her big stern rise up in the air as she went down bow first,’ he said.
‘I saw the machinery drop out of her. I was in the water about half an hour and could hear the cries of thousands of people, it seemed.’
Whiteley then drifted to an upturned lifeboat which he said around 30 men were clinging to.
‘They refused to let me get on. Someone tried to hit me with an oar, but I scrambled on to her,’ he said.
He added: ‘When I last saw the captain he was in the water trying to place a baby in one of the lifeboats crowded with people.
‘Some women tried to drag him on the boat, but he pulled away from them and said: ‘Save yourselves.’ I saw him go under, and he never came up.’
Whiteley was rescued by the Carpathia at around 8.40am. On arrival in New York, he was taken to hospital and treated for a right leg fracture and numerous bruises.
He filed a lawsuit against the White Star Line claiming the Titanic had been unseaworthy but it never came to court.
Whiteley went on to serve in the First World War before having a career as an actor which saw him star in the film version of Journey’s End.
The former steward also served in the Second World War as a warrant officer and was present during the North Africa landings in 1942.
Mr Bancroft says that in circumstances which ‘remain a mystery’, he died at the age of 50 while on his way to a hospital in Italy in 1944 ‘apparently as a result of cardiac problems’.
{{Smoke room steward James Witter}}
James Witter, who was born in 1880, near Ormskirk, West Lancashire, and worked as a smoke room steward on the Titanic.
He recalled being told how the ‘bloody mail room was full of water’.
Witter then told everyone in his cabin to ‘get up, she’s going down’ but was told by one disbelieving man to ‘get out of here’ before one of them ‘threw a boot’ at him.
In July 1912, Witter signed on to work on the Oceanic and remained at sea for many more years.
He continued to serve with the White Star Line and then with Cunard White Star.
He worked on many of the great transatlantic liners, including the Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth.
However, Mr Bancroft says that Witter ‘rarely spoke’ of the disaster as it was said to have ‘haunted him for the rest of his life’.
He died in Southampton on September 12, 1956, at the age of 80.
{{Curious traveller Algie Barkworth }}
Algie Barkworth was born in Hessle, near Kingston upon Hull, in June 1864, and was educated at Eton.
Barkworth had booked his passage on the Titanic to see what the ship was like and had intended to stay abroad for around a month.
He recalled hearing a ‘grinding sound’ when he was sitting on the Titanic’s deck with his friends.
Barkworth said it caused the ship to ‘tremble’ before the engines ‘seemed to stop’. He was then told the ship had hit an iceberg and saw how pieces of ice had fallen on to the ship’s deck.
Later, he noted the order being given to passengers to put on their lifebelts.
As passengers were being loaded into lifeboats, Barkworth also noted how the ship’s band continued playing as the ship sank. He said they were ‘playing a waltz tune’.
‘Soon afterwards we went to see the boats lowered. The escaping steam making a deafening sound, women and children were put into the boats first,’ he said.
‘When most of the boats had left the ship, she began to list forward.’
He added: ‘I learned swimming at Eton and made up my mind if it came to the worst I would try my luck in the water.’
Barkworth then had to put his swimming skills to good use.
‘I had on a fur coat with the lifebelt strapped to the outside…When I came up, I swam for all I was worth to get away from the sinking ship,’ he said.
‘Coming across a floating plank, I rested upon it. Looking over my should I saw Titanic disappear with a volley of loud reports, so I swam slowly around and came luckily upon an overturned lifeboat.
He added that, after climbing in to the boat, the ‘scrams of the drowning were most terrible’.
‘Several more people climbed up the stern of the boat, which was now full. We competed to keep everyone else from gathering upon.’
Later, his boat began taking on water. When he and his fellow survivors were finally rescued by the Carpathia, the water ‘was up to our knees’.
Once he reached America, Barkworth wrote to his family to tell them he was safe. A report appeared in his local newspaper which announced: ‘Please announce Algernon Barkworth, Hessle, arrived New York on Carpathia, ex Titanic sank. Jumped into sea, drop thirty feet. Just before she sank.
‘Swam clear, and saw Titanic sink. Cold intense. Held onto overturned lifeboat for six hours. Picked up eventually by one of Titanic’s boats. Suffering from frost-bitten fingers.’
Barkworth lived for the rest of his life at his family home, Tranby House, and remained unmarried.
He carried on his work as a Justice of the Peace following the disaster and continued in his post until a year before his death, in January 1945 at the age of 80.
{{Ship stewardess Violet Jessop }}
Violet Jessop was born in October 1887 in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
She worked as a stewardess and was on board the White Star Line ship the Olympic when it collided with HMS Hawke in the Solent in 1911.
She then transferred to the Titanic when her friends persuaded her it would be ‘wonderful’.
After the ship hit the iceberg, she recalled being ordered up on deck, where passengers ‘calmly’ walked around.
‘I stood at the bulkhead with the other stewardesses, watching the women cling to their husbands before being put into the boats with their children.
‘Sometime after, a ship’s officer ordered us into the boat [16] first to show some women it was safe.’
Jessop then said she was handed a baby by one of the ship’s officers but that a woman later ‘leaped at me’ and took the baby before rushing off with it.
‘It appeared that she put it down on the deck of Titanic while she went off to fetch something, and when she came back the baby had gone,’ she added.
During the First World War she worked as a nurse with the British Red Cross and was assigned to work on the HMHS Britannic, which had been converted into a hospital ship.
Jessop was involved in her third disaster when the ship hit a mine as it crossed the Aegean Sea. It sank within an hour and killed 30 people.
The nurse survived after jumping into the water. It was her belief that her thick auburn hair cushioned a heavy blow to her head, therefore saving her life.
She continued to work for the White Star Line after the war before being employed by the Red Star Line and Royal Mail Line.
She retired from her time at sea in 1950 and lived in a thatched cottage in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk.
She died at the age of 84 of congestive heart failure in 1971.
{{Alice Phillips – travelling to the US with her father, who was taking a job}}
Alice Phillips was born in Devon in January 1891.
After her mother’s death from tuberculosis, her father Escott Robert Phillips secured a position to work as a factory foreman in Pittsburgh and so made the necessary plans to go to America.
They had been due to board the American Lines ship the Philadelphia but were transferred to the Titanic because a coal strike forced its cancellation.
She noted being ‘dreadfully frightened’ by the thud of the Titanic hitting the iceberg
She said she ran outside and was told by a cabin steward that ‘everything is all right’ and that she should go back to her cabin.
‘Father came to my cabin, and asked if I would care to go on deck with him; so I did. We had not been there long when someone said “All on deck with lifebelts on!”, she said.
In a letter to her family, she recalled the ‘sounds of general confusion’ on the deck and went outside before being picked up and put in to one of the lifeboats.
‘I cannot tell you, dear, how I felt in that moment. Dad and I got our belts on, and I went on deck again, and then all the women and children were put into lifeboats and lowered,’ she wrote.
‘I saw my dear father for the last time in this world, and I almost felt I would have liked to die with him.
‘There were already a large number of other women and children in the boat, and I had not been in it a few moments, and did not even fully understand what was the matter, when it was pushed off into darkness.
‘That was the last I saw of Titanic, and I shall never see my poor father again.’
Phillip then noted how her lifeboat drifted for nine hours in the ‘intense’ cold before they were rescued by the Carpathia.
Phillips became ill as a result of the sinking but recovered to work as a stenographer. She later returned to England and moved to Manchester.
She married accounts clerk Henry Leslie Mead and had a daughter in 1921.
However, Phillips contracted influenza and died in 1923 at the age of just 31.
{{Esther Hart and her daughter Eva}}
Young Eva Hart was on board the Titanic with her mother Esther and her father Benjamin.
She was born in 1905, while her mother was born in 1863, in Stockwell, Surrey.
As the Titanic was sinking, Esther and Eva, aged 7, were put into lifeboat 14.
Esther recalled: ‘I know that there was a cry of: “She’s sinking!” I heard hoarse shouts of “Women and children first,” and then from boat to boat we were hurried, only to be told “already full”.
‘Four boats we tried, and at the fifth there was room. Eva was thrown in first, and I followed her.’
She then recalled how one of the ship’s officers fired his revolver into the air when a man tried to climb in.
She said the Officer warned, ‘The next, man who puts his foot in this boat I will shoot him down like a dog.’
Benjamin Hart gave his wife his coat to keep her and Eva warm but told them he was not going to get in the boat. He pleaded, ‘for God’s sake look after my wife and child’.
Eva told the officer with the gun, ‘Don’t shoot my daddy! You can’t shoot my daddy.’
Esther then said that was the last she saw of her husband. She recalled how the ship sank beneath the waves with a ‘mighty and tearing sob’.
The Carpathia then rescued them at 8am.
After the disaster, Esther and Eva returned to Britain to live with her parents. Esther died in September 1928, at the age of 65.
Eva went on to become a professional singer and was awarded an MBE in 1974. She died in February 1996 at the age of 91.
{{Charles Lightoller – the Titanic’s second officer}}
Charles Lightoller was the second officer on board the Titanic.
Mr Bancroft describes how the seaman had a ‘most eventful and adventurous life’.
He was born in 1874 and became apprenticed to the William Price Line of Liverpool in February 1888.
After a series of promotions, he was appointed first officer of the Titanic.
On the night of the disaster, he was falling asleep when he felt the grinding vibration of the ship hitting the iceberg.
He was then informed that water had reached the mail room. After the situation became perilous, Lightoller began loading women and children into lifeboats.
While doing so, the Titanic plunged forward and Lightoller was forced to dive into the sea. The ship’s forward funnel, which broke loose and toppled, narrowly missed him.
Lightoller then found himself alongside the collapsible B lifeboat, which 25 men, including Barkworth and Bride, had climbed on.
As the most senior surviving officer, he was called to testify at the American and British inquiries into the disaster.
It saw him defend the captain and other members of the crew against some of the charges levelled at them.
He returned to sea in 1913, where he became first officer of liner the Oceanic.
During the First World War, the Oceanic was commissioned as an armed cruiser and Lightoller became a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy.
For his actions in the war, he was awarded a Distinguished Service Cross.
He was later given command of a torpedo boat, followed by the destroyer HMS Garry.
After the war, Lightoller returned to the White Star Line and was appointed chief officer of the Celtic liner.
He later opened a guest house and his youngest son Brian, an RAF pilot, was killed during a World War Two bombing raid in May 1940.
Incredibly, when aged 66, Lightoller accompanied his eldest son Roger to sail his yacht the Sundowner to Dunkirk, in Northern France, to help rescue British and French troops from advancing German forces.
In total, they carried 130 men from the beaches.
After the war, Lightoller went into the boat building business before he died from heart disease in 1952, aged 78.
The statement is meant to assess economic and financial developments of the year 2020 and give an outlook for the year 2021 and beyond.
In 2020, mobile banking transactions increased in volume by 183 percent from 2 million to 6 million and by 224 percent in value from Rwf 85 billion in 2019 to Rwf 277 billion of transactions.
During 2020, active mobile payment subscribers (transacted in the previous 90 days) increased by 13 percent from 4,139,075 to 4,688,124 while the number of mobile agents increased by 33 percent from 98,359 to 131,173. Mobile payment transactions increased by 85 percent from 378.8 million worth Rwf2,349 billion Rwf in 2019 to 701 million worth Rwf 7,177 billion Rwf in 2020.
The report shows that comparing 2019 to 2020, the portion of cash-based transactions significantly reduced as a consequence of various policies taken to encourage digital payments and minimize the risk of COVID-19 spreading.
Banks which provided internet-banking services increased to thirteen (13) from nine (9) in December 2019 and the number of subscribers increased by 9 percent from 91,825 in December 2019 to 99,810 in December 2020.
In 2020, internet banking transactions increased by 7 percent to 1,445,174 in 2020 from 1,352,301 in 2019 and by 4 percent in terms of value to Rwf 2,362 billion in 2020 from Rwf 2,276 Billion in 2019
{{Card based payment services}}
The number of traditional Point of Sale (POS) machines increased from 3,477 in December 2019 to 4,335 in December 2020. During this period, POS transactions increased by 56 percent in volume from 2,426,456 in December 2019 to 3,780,051 in 2020, while in value, POS transactions increased by 9 percent from Rwf 109 billion in 2019 to Rwf 120 billion in December 2020.
On the other hand, Automated Teller Machines (ATM) decreased from 383 in 2019 to 334 in 2020 due to the fact that two banks moved from ATMs services to Agency banking services. In terms of usage, ATM transactions decreased by 9 percent in volume from 10,061,164 in 2019 to 9,203,942 in December 2020, though the value increased by 17 percent in value from Rwf 578 billion to Rwf 679 billion considering that most people have been withdrawing larger amounts due to the limited access to ATMs during the lockdown period.
Mobile POS contributed the most to increased usage of electronic payments compared to other types of POS during the period under review.
As at end of December 2020, the number of mobile POS increased significantly to 39,7434 in December 2020 from 13,675 in 2019 due to increased adoption by various businesses such as supermarkets, retail shops, health centers and specifically microbusinesses.
They are an addition to 347,000 vaccines Rwanda received on Wednesday through COVAX initiative.
These vaccines were delivered to 50 hospitals yesterday from where they were distributed to health centers that have started vaccinating targeted groups this Friday.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Dr. Vincent Biruta has said that these 50,000 vaccines arrived in Rwanda on Friday morning.
“Pleased to receive 50,000 doses of Covid-19 vaccines from India this morning. The Government of Rwanda is grateful to the Government of India and other partner countries for their valuable contribution to the fight against COVID-19,” he said.
Rwanda has so far received 397,000 vaccines in three shipments including 102,960 Pfizer vaccines, 240, 000 AstraZeneca vaccines and more 50,000 AstraZeneca vaccines received today.
Rwanda plans to vaccinate 30% of the population by 2021.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has via Twitter account revealed that Minister Biruta received the vaccines at Kigali International Airport along with Oscar Kerketta, High Commissioner of India to Rwanda.
Health practitioners, patients with incurable diseases like blood pressure, diabetes and asthma among other respiratory diseases will be among the first group to be vaccinated in the first phase along with elders above 65 years and people whose line of duty puts them in a susceptible position.
“Helicopters from Rwanda Defense Force and Rwanda National Police are now delivering COVID-19 vaccines to remote parts of 14 different Districts. They will be picked up by District hospitals for distribution to area health centres. All vaccine shots will be administered within 48 hours starting Friday,” reads the tweet.
The distribution comes a day after receiving 342, 960 COVID-19 vaccines in two batches comprised of Pfizer and AstraZeneca doses.
The first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines comprised of 240,000 AstraZeneca doses arrived in Rwanda yesterday morning followed by the second batch of 102, l960 Pfizer vaccines in the evening.
Health practitioners, patients with incurable diseases like blood pressure, diabetes and asthma among other respiratory diseases will be among the first group to be vaccinated in the first phase along with elders above 65 years and people whose line of duty puts them in a susceptible position.
The first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines comprised of 240,000 AstraZeneca doses arrived in Rwanda yesterday morning followed by the second batch of 102, 1960 Pfizer vaccines in the evening.
Rwanda has become the first African country to receive Pfizer vaccines distributed through COVAX, a global initiative aimed at working with vaccine producers to provide countries worldwide with equitable access to safe and effective vaccine.
The second batch of Pfizer vaccines was received by the Minister of Health, Dr. Daniel Ngamije along with other officials and diplomats including the Head of Delegation of the European Union to Rwanda, Amb. Nicola Bellomo.
Pfizer is among COVID-19 vaccines with 95% efficacy.
Pfizer vaccines can be stored in refrigerated conditions of -70 Celsius degree.
As he received Astrezeneca vaccines on Wednesday morning, the Minister of Health, Dr. Daniel Ngamije said that vaccination program has already started in Rwanda.
“We plan to vaccinate 7.8 million Rwandans. You know that many countries need vaccines but we are doing all the necessary to get them to vaccinate Rwandans as soon as we can and return to normalcy,” he said.
Dr. Ngamije has revealed that targeted people to be vaccinated effective from 5th March 2021 include health workers, frontline worker, elders above the age of 65 living with chronic diseases are.
He highlighted that 7.8 million Rwandans will have been vaccinated not later than June 2022.
Received vaccines will be distributed countrywide effective Thursday 4th February 2021 whereby targeted persons will be communicated to get vaccinated at health centers.
The country will receive batches of vaccines every month in proportion to the number of people to be vaccinated.
So far, a total of 249 million vaccines have been distributed globally.
Rwanda received 342, 960 COVID-19 vaccines in two batches comprised of Pfizer and AstraZeneca doses.
Covax is a global initiative aimed at working with vaccine producers to provide countries worldwide with equitable access to safe and effective vaccine.
The first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines comprised of 240,000 AstraZeneca doses arrived in Rwanda yesterday morning followed by the second batch of 102, l960 Pfizer vaccines in the evening.
As the first shipment arrived, Kagame hailed Covax initiative via Twitter handle noting that the vaccines have come in handy.
“It’s been long wait, some better prepared and more ready…not to mention some ‘more equal than others’ But certainly all of us in urgent need. Now good news to see COVID-19 Vaccines arrive in Africa starting with Ghana…this morning in Rwanda & more. Thanks #COVAX,” he said .
Rwanda received vaccines following other African countries including Ghana and Nigeria.
The country will receive batches of vaccines every month in proportion to the number of people to be vaccinated.
The European Union (EU) and Rwanda’s Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN) recently signed a grant contract to support and increase digital based employment opportunities in high potential economic sectors through these hubs.
This is financed from the EU’s programme to support private sector development and job creation in Rwanda adopted in 2020.
HANGA Hubs will provide space and support for young labour market entrants and start-ups to adopt innovative technologies to enhance productivity, competitiveness, and growth.
Commenting on the development, the Head of Delegation of the European Union to Rwanda, Amb. Nicola Bellomo said that HANGA hubs will help aspiring young entrepreneurs to react to market demands.
“Start-ups can significantly transform and strengthen the economy. They may be small, but they are dynamic, flexible and able to react to market demands. Going by its meaning, HANGA or “Create” hubs will be the home for creative, innovating start-ups, where aspiring young entrepreneurs will find support and help of other entrepreneurs, role models, mentors and fellowships along their journey,” he said.
The HANGA hubs project will be implemented by the Rwanda Information Society Authority (RISA) in close collaboration with ICT Chamber and several other players in the ecosystem. This project will address gaps in Rwanda’s innovation ecosystem limiting the pipeline of start-ups and innovations, namely lack of tech-entrepreneurship support and access to services for tech-based innovative start-ups.
“This intervention is timely and aligns well with our Government efforts to strengthen and expand the tech-enabled innovation ecosystem in Rwanda. This initiative seeks to ensure that opportunities for tech-innovation and start-up incubation are made easy and equally accessible for all young innovators regardless of where they are located in the country,” said Paula Ingabire, the Minister of ICT and Innovation.
“The project will target potential entrepreneurs with constructive ideas and solutions in key sectors of the economy such as health, agriculture, financial services, tourism and hospitality, construction, education, and many others,” she added.
Hanga Hubs Project is expected to support over 768 young Innovators to undergo a 9-month incubation program, which will result into creation of 192 start-ups.
Support services that would be offered to innovators in the 4 HANGA Hubs will range from business support; market and customer validation support ; Business-to-business (B2B) matching; networking and exposure trips to allow incubated start-ups to attain an early growth stage that could trigger investment.
The vaccines are distributed through COVAX, a global initiative aimed at working with vaccine producers to provide countries worldwide with equitable access to safe and effective vaccine.
The AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, codenamed AZD1222, is a COVID-19 vaccine developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca given by intramuscular injection.
One dosing regimen showed 90% efficacy when a half-dose was followed by a full-dose after at least one month, based on mixed trials with no participants over 55 years old.
Another dosing regimen showed 62% efficacy when given as two full doses separated by at least one month.
On 30 December 2020, the vaccine was approved for use in the United Kingdom’s vaccination programme, and the first vaccination outside of a trial was administered on 4th January 2021.
As he received vaccines, the Minister of Health, Dr. Daniel Ngamije said that vaccination program has already started in Rwanda.
“We plan to vaccinate 7.8 million Rwandans. You know that many countries need vaccines but we are doing all the necessary to get them to vaccinate Rwandans as soon as we can and return to normalcy,” he said.
Dr. Ngamije has revealed that targeted people to be vaccinated effective from 5th March 2021 include health workers, frontline worker, elders above the age of 65 living with chronic diseases are.
He highlighted that 7.8 million Rwandans will have been vaccinated not later than June 2022.
Received vaccines will be distributed countrywide effective Thursday 4th February 2021 whereby targeted persons will be communicated to get vaccinated at health centers.
Rwanda also awaits 102 960 Pfizer vaccines today evening while more 500,000 vaccines are expected next week.
The country will receive batches of vaccines every month in proportion to the number of people to be vaccinated.
So far, a total of 249 million vaccines have been distributed globally.
Father Rugirangoga is renowned for divine healing prayers, psychiatric as well as unity and reconciliation initiatives. He died in the United States in January from respiratory complications stemming from Covid-19.
His body was flown to Rwanda in the night of Saturday 27th February 2021.
On 1st March 2021, a farewell mass read by Cardinal Antoine Kambanda was held at Regina Pacis Catholic Church in Remera before Rugirangoga’s body was taken to Mushaka parish for burial on 2nd March 2021.
As he paid tribute to late Rugirangoga, Kambanda said that Ubald was characterized by a sense of responsibility to re-build the Rwandan community highlighting that the deceased left a good legacy of striving for peace, unity and reconciliation.
The requiem mass held at Mushaka Parish today has attracted clerics, Christians, relatives and friends to bid farewell to late Father Rugirangoga before laying him to rest at Agasozi k’Ibanga ry’Amahoro (Hill of Secrete to Peace) located in Kamatita cell, Gihundwe sector, Rusizi district of Western Province.
The hill of 25 hectares is located in Nkanka Parish, Cyangugu Diocese. It was conceived by Father Rugirangoga who sought to establish a center where people will gather for to pray for a peaceful world and forgive each other.
The mass was also attended by Katse Long, a US resident and friend to late Ubald who escorted his body on a plane to Rwanda.
Church services were led by the Bishop of Gikongoro Diocese and Apostolic Administrator of Cyangugu Diocese, Hakizimana Célestin Bishop Hakizimana along with the Bishop of Ruhengeri Diocese, Vincent Harorimana.
Bishop Hakizimana has said that Father Rugirangoga helped many people to model unity and reconciliation and healed wounds through psychiatric initiatives.
He comforted those he helped not to sink into sorrow noting that Rugirangoga has gone in God’s safe hands.
“Those he helped through psychiatric initiatives should not feel despaired because they have an interceder by the side of God,” he said.
Rugwizangoga Revelien, the brother to Father Rugirangoga has said that his elder brother was a zealous and dedicated person with kind heart and unconditional love towards people throughout his entire life.
Rugirangoga is a son of Kabera Jacques and Mukaruhamya Anesia. The had sired together four children, of whom one was killed during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
“My elder brother has been a caring person, a parent, a good friend and great advisor with outstanding experience you are aware of. During his service as a priest, I am sure that he was a good advisor and friend to everyone. His heart and house were always open,” said Rugwizangoga.
The mayor of Rusizi district, Kayumba Ephrem revealed that Father Rugirangoga had good collaboration with local leadership in his functions where he would notify them of activities he is organizing or advice the district on planned activities.
“You have departed early but God has loved your more. We are assured that the Hill of Secrete to Peace will always be blessed because of your advocacy. May Your Soul Rest In Peace,” he said.
In his message on behalf of the clergy, Bishop Hakizimana condoled with relatives of late Father Rugirangoga, Christians, Rwandans and their friends especially those who had a pact of friendship with Ubald.
He requested Christians and clerics to emulate his good deeds and take on his work praying for patients and promoting unity and reconciliation.
Bishop Hakizimana also thanked Ketsey Long who stayed closer with Ubald for tyeh past 12 years, Les Amis d’Ubald (Friends of Ubald) among others who provided support to repatriate his body to Rwanda.
Ketsey Long also received a gift in souvenir of late Father Rugirangoga.
Father Rugirangoga has prayed for many patients some of whom recovered from sight problems, HIV/AIDS, Diabetis among other incurable or hardly curable diseases.
He always attributed the healing to Jesus.
Speaking to IGIHE in 2015, Father Rugirangoga revealed that he started healing prayers in 1987 when he was a young priest. “Later in 1991, I started seeing visuals and hearing strange voices speaking to me. In the four previous years, I used to pray for people who would come to tell me that they have recovered,” he said.
Niyibizi Verena from Kicukiro district recently said that he recovered from heart disease in 2015 after attending Ubald’s healing prayers. He had suffered from the disease for nine years that hospitals in Rwanda, Kenya, Belgium and Germany had failed him.
Father Ubald Rugiranoga was born in February 155 in former Rwabidege sector, Mwezi parish in Commune Karengera, Prefecture Cyangugu currently in Rusizi district. He was ordained priest in 1984 at the age of 29. He used to organize different gospel crusades in which many people healed from different diseases.
In 2015, Father Rugirangoga was selected Protector of Friendship Pact ‘Umurinzi w’Igihango’ for outstanding contribution to unity and reconciliation initiatives that started in Mushaka Parish and extended countrywide.
Among others, Father Rugirangoga encouraged Genocide perpetrators to seek forgiveness and survivors to forgive offenders as a healing process from the wounds of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
In 2019, Father Rugirangoga wrote a book dubbed “Forgiveness Makes You Free” aimed at consolidating Rwandans unity and reconciliation efforts.
Prior to his death early January 2021, Ubald was the head priest at Mushaka Parish and had requested his Bishop to be assigned in a parish where he could easily pray for mass public and help them along unity and reconciliation journey.
He has been a priest for over 32 years and died at the age of 62.
