In Italy we have had hundreds of them, each with his own story, his family, his dedication to his work. Kenya too has its symbols of the fight against Covid-19.
Yesterday, one of the 'angels' of the wards, whom I prefer to call 'double humans', because they add the adjective to the noun, died, defeated by the very disease that he not only fought and treated, but of which he strenuously raised awareness of the danger and the high contagious potential.
Wycliffe Alumasa was not only a nurse at Kakamega County Hospital, but also a champion of enforcing rules, wearing masks and respecting people by keeping his distance.
Every morning, before going to work, he would drive his car around the whole town and ask those who were not wearing masks why they were doing so, after which he would qualify himself and explain his point of view professionally.
Eventually, with the help of sponsors, he would give the mask to the unsuspecting or unbelieving person.
Then he would go to the police and say: 'I've caught a hundred, and you?'.
And he would report on the areas of highest risk, areas of lowest respect, and so on.
Eventually, the cops themselves would follow him and use his method of raising awareness before repression and punishment.
Wycliffe was now famous in the city.
He had organised a big distribution at Boda Boda and his mechanic remembers that when he took his car to be repaired, he asked him not to touch the inside of the vehicle or even the engine unless he wore an approved mask.
This is what he did, his friends say, with other shopkeepers. He would not buy or greet anyone who was not wearing a mask.
Fatally, after nine months of uninterrupted work alongside Coronavirus patients, Wycliffe tested positive and went into isolation at home, but within a week his condition had visibly worsened and by the time he was taken to hospital in recent days there was nothing more he could do. "I already knew it would be a miracle if he recovered from that condition," his wife Veronica told the press.
Like him, many other nurses and doctors in Kenya are still struggling against a virus that, although less terrible than in many other countries in Europe and the Americas, here in Kenya is added to many other diseases that have always been present and whose treatment is entrusted to hospital structures that are only now trying to improve, with many problems. Between those who threaten strikes, those who fall ill and have to stay at home, and many other health workers who are hired by private facilities inaccessible to ordinary people, it is hoped that others will follow the example left by Alumasa: prevention in Africa can be much more useful and possible than cure.