Harambee Starlets head coach David Ouma has confirmed that his team went into self-quarantine for a fortnight following their return from competing in international tournament in Europe.
Starlets took part at the invitational Turkish Women Cup earlier this month and returned home on March 12. Turkey is one of the countries that has recorded the highest coronavirus infections.
“I can confirm that the team has fully practiced social distancing because both players and officials who had travelled to Turkey immediately got into self quarantine after arriving back to Kenya following the outbreak of Covid-19,” Ouma said.
“Also note the team travelled with full-time medics, doctor David Ndakalu and physiotherapist Bruce Juma, who had our medical matters covered both in Turkey and after we came back. The doctors also oversaw the testing exercise at Mbagathi hospital when the team returned and are constantly checking up on us all,” added Ouma on phone.
Ouma said that their 14-day quarantine ends Wednesday after landing back into the country on March 12 and is confident that every one who accompanied the team to Turkey is in good health since Turkey had not recorded any case of the virus when they were there.
“We are cautiously following the government directive of staying at home until further notice. I have advised the players to continue staying at home and only visit the hospitals if they are showing any of the symptoms,” said Ouma on Tuesday.
However, Nation Sport understands Juma checked himself into a hospital on Wednesday after complaining of a fever and flu.
Starlets finished third in the medal bracket after beating Northern Ireland 2-0 and losing 5-0 and 3-1 to Chile and Ghana respectively in the nine-team contest held in Turkey.
Before the indefinite lockdown and cancellation of sporting events worldwide, Ouma’s charges were meant to kick off their Africa Women Cup of Nations (Awcon) qualifiers campaign from April 6 with their first match scheduled against Tanzania.