Oldest and youngest Moroccan coronavirus patients make full recovery within hours of each other

The oldest and youngest people to be infected with coronavirus in Morocco have made full recoveries, authorities said on Sunday and Monday.

Mohamed El-Youbi, the director of the epidemiology department at Morocco's ministry of health told journalists at a press conference on Monday that Morocco's oldest coronavirus patient, a 96-year-old woman, had made a full recovery.

El-Youbi stressed that coronavirus was not a death sentence for elderly patients or those with serious pre-existing conditions.

On Sunday, a three-month-old baby, identified as "Sama", left the King Hassan II Hospital in the city of Fes after she was completely cured of coronavirus.

Moroccan Prime Minister Saadeddine Othmani tweeted that she was the youngest coronavirus patient in the North African kingdom, congratulating her parents.

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Sama had spent 16 days in hospital and was said to have been in a "critical state" before her recovery.

She is also reportedly the second youngest coronavirus patient in the world, after an American newborn.

At the press conference El-Youbi said that Morocco had the coronavirus pandemic under control and was still in the "second phase" of the pandemic.

"We were expecting this and getting ready for the situation since the outbreak of the pandemic in Hubei [China]," he said.

He added that the country is trying to avoid the critical “third phase” where the Covid-19 virus spreads exponentially with a high number of daily deaths.

Morocco has so far confirmed 1,764 cases of coronavirus, with 120 deaths and 194 recoveries.

Rabat imposed a public health state of emergency on 19 March, confining everyone to their homes except those with a permit to be out of work. They have also made the wearing of face masks in public mandatory.

Over the weekend, over 4,300 people were arrested for breaking the lockdown rules.