We’re Expecting a rise of COVID-19 in Nigeria – NCDC

Mr Chikwe Ihekweazu, who’s the Director General of Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC) has stated that the agency expects a rise in the number of coronavirus (COVID-19) cases in Nigeria to keep rising in the possible short term, profjaysblog reports.

According to the figures displayed by the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC) on their official site, the country has recorded a total number of 111 confirmed cases of the covid-19 as at 9:30pm on Sunday, 29th March, 2020. This number was after President Buhari had finished addressing Nigerians that saw a total lockdown of Lagos, Abuja and Ogun State starting from 11:00pm on Monday 30th March, 2020 for at least 14days to combat the spread of the virus.

Mr Chikwe Ihekweazu while speaking on Channels TV on Monday, he said the infectious rate of the virus means the country will experience a rise in a short term.

“We’ve crossed the 100 mark and the reality is there’s a virus circling in our midst, and that is why Mr President came up yesterday to speak to Nigerians.

“In the short term, we do expect the numbers to keep rising, but we also expect that we’ll be able to get on top of this,” he said.

He noted that Buhari’s extra measures are needed, and that it’s a call for Nigerians to rally together and support these measures.

“From today, we’ll appeal to Nigerians to bear the few weeks of pain that’ll come. Stay at home as much as possible,” he appealed.

The NCDC boss also noted that Nigeria has been lucky so far with the virus as its cases have been mild to moderate with one death unfortunately recorded.

A major concern about Nigeria’s response has been its low number of testing conducted after one month which Ihekweazu put at around 2,000 in total on Monday.

He, however, noted that that the agency is focused on increasing the capacity for testing.

“There are new test technologies that have just been approved. We’ve already started the procurement process for that. They should be in the country in the next couple of weeks,” he said.

Nigeria has recorded 111 cases in 12 states – Lagos (68), FCT (21), Ogun (3), Enugu (2), Ekiti (1), Oyo (7), Edo (2), Bauchi (2), Osun (2), Rivers (1), Benue (1), and Kaduna (1).