Nigeria develops capacity to conduct 3,000 coronavirus tests daily

April 16, 2020
209 Views

The Nigerian government is beginning to make progress in the fight to contain the spread of coronavirus in the country. The country has developed higher capacity to conduct coronavirus test. The government also expanded approach to include house-to-house community test, at the moment in FCT, Abuja. The test centres have been increased to 13 while daily test capacity has been increased to 3,000.

Though, this is far below the intervention in South Africa which has developed capacity to test 30,000 persons daily as the South African government deployed 67 mobile test centres.

The Director-General of the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC), Dr. Chikwe Iheweazu, at the daily briefing of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 on Wednesday, disclosed that Nigeria now has the capacity to test 3,000 persons daily.

He, however, lamented that the major challenge is getting the right samples for testing.

Iheweazu stated: “We now have the capacity of testing 3,000 per day. That capacity is not being fully utilized. That is why I focused on Lagos State and the FCT and the efforts they are making to get more people tested and more samples in.

“We’ve improved testing capacity. The bottleneck now is getting the samples from the right people.”

The NCDC DG further disclosed that the government is setting up 20 healthcare facilities in Lagos soon.

He further narrated: “In Abuja, in certain communities, we are going door to door and collecting samples from people who have an acute respiratory infection… collecting samples from people that think they have an acute respiratory infection.”

There is need for the government to move fast to avert coronavirus epidemic in Nigeria which may overwhelm health facilities in the country.

PV: 0

You may be interested

Raphinha: I Decided To Remain At Barca To Prove Doubters Wrong
Sports
1 views
Sports
1 views

Raphinha: I Decided To Remain At Barca To Prove Doubters Wrong

Webby - November 1, 2024

Barcelona star Raphinha says his decision to remain with the club is meant to prove doubters wrong.Recall that the Brazilian…

Iheanacho Thrilled To End Sevilla’s Goal Drought
Sports
5 views
Sports
5 views

Iheanacho Thrilled To End Sevilla’s Goal Drought

Webby - October 31, 2024

Super Eagles forward Kelechi Iheanacho is full of excitement after opening his goal account for LaLiga club Sevilla.Iheanacho netted a…

I’m Ready To Return To Football –Ranieri
Sports
1 views
Sports
1 views

I’m Ready To Return To Football –Ranieri

Webby - October 31, 2024

Former Cagliari manager Claudio Ranieri has expressed his desire to return to football.Ranieri, who stood down from Cagliari at the…

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published.