Back to Africa Check

Yes, Ghana’s president said worker infected 533 others with Covid-19 at factory

“A worker infected 533 others with coronavirus at a factory in Ghana, president says,” claims a 25 May 2020 article on the site Report RSA.

“All 533 of them contracted the virus from one worker at the factory in the port city of Tema, the president said in his public address to the nation Sunday.”

The article has been flagged as possibly false by Facebook’s fact-checking system. But it’s correct.


 

Factory closed down


In an update on Ghana’s coronavirus outbreak broadcast on 10 May, president Nana Akufo-Addo announced 921 newly confirmed cases of Covid-19, part of a backlog in testing since 26 April.

“It is important to stress that 533 out of the 921 new cases recorded between last Wednesday and Thursday are factory workers from a fish processing factory located in Tema,” the president said. “All 533 persons were infected by one person.”

Tema is a coastal city east of Accra, Ghana’s capital.

Abraham Koomson, the head of the Ghana Federation of Labour, reportedly told Reuters that the 533 cases were at Thai Union’s Pioneer Food Cannery Limited plant, and that the facility had closed down. A handful of workers at another fish processing plant in Tema had also tested positive.

As of 26 May, Ghana had reported 6,808 confirmed cases of Covid-19 to the World Health Organization, and 32 deaths. It currently has the second highest number of cases in West Africa after Nigeria, and the fourth highest on the continent. – Mary Alexander

 


 

Republish our content for free

Please complete this form to receive the HTML sharing code.

For publishers: what to do if your post is rated false

A fact-checker has rated your Facebook or Instagram post as “false”, “altered”, “partly false” or “missing context”. This could have serious consequences. What do you do?

Click on our guide for the steps you should follow.

Publishers guide

Africa Check teams up with Facebook

Africa Check is a partner in Meta's third-party fact-checking programme to help stop the spread of false information on social media.

The content we rate as “false” will be downgraded on Facebook and Instagram. This means fewer people will see it.

You can also help identify false information on Facebook. This guide explains how.

Add new comment

Restricted HTML

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a href hreflang> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote cite> <code> <ul type> <ol start type> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <h2 id> <h3 id> <h4 id> <h5 id> <h6 id>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.
limit: 600 characters

Want to keep reading our fact-checks?

We will never charge you for verified, reliable information. Help us keep it that way by supporting our work.

Become a newsletter subscriber

Support independent fact-checking in Africa.