Coronavirus: Angola reports first 2 deaths

By Hassan Isilow

JOHANNESBURG (AA) - Angola has reported its first two deaths from COVID-19, according to local media reports published on Monday.

Health Minister Silvia Lutukuta said the deceased are two Angolan nationals, age 37 and 59, who both returned from Portugal two weeks ago, according to a report Monday by Jornal de Angola, a Portuguese-language website.

He said the 59-year-old Angolan living in Portugal arrived in the country with mild symptoms but later developed severe respiratory complications and died on Saturday.

The 37-year-old was hospitalized for a week after arriving in the country but lost the battle to the virus.

The southwest African country currently has seven cases of COVID-19 with 1,089 people under institutional quarantine.

The novel coronavirus was first detected in Wuhan, China in December. There are currently over 737,000 cases worldwide and over 35,000 reported deaths with more than 156,000 recoveries, according to U.S.-based Johns Hopkins University.

Despite the severity of the virus, most people experience mild symptoms before making a recovery.